Leap Year, dir. Anand Tucker, 2010.
Starring Amy Adams and Matthew Goode.
What a waste of Amy Adams. How could she go from her luminous, affecting, authentic performance in, say, Junebug, to this forced cliche? She tries her best to carry the film, since her co-star, Matthew Goode, is just good looks and fumbled, mumbled Irish accent. The camera lingers on the curve of her cheek and the sheen in her eyes, but in the end it's hopeless.
This movie adheres pretty slavishly to the classic romcom roadtrip plotline (spoiled rich girl meets cynical laconic man who falls for her during the course of numerous plot twists and reversals). Since It Happened One Night there have been probably dozens of retellings, including in Bollywood. Some of them felt quite fresh at the time (such as A Sure Thing, in 1985, with John Cusack at the height of his ragged, boyish charm).
Perhaps the only thing different here was that the female lead gets most of the screentime. But otherwise predictable, boring, and uninspired. In fact, it seems Matthew Goode went on record as saying that he reckoned this film was the year's worst, and he took the part only as it allowed him to fly back to London on weekends.
What a waste.
1*
2015
Starring Amy Adams and Matthew Goode.
What a waste of Amy Adams. How could she go from her luminous, affecting, authentic performance in, say, Junebug, to this forced cliche? She tries her best to carry the film, since her co-star, Matthew Goode, is just good looks and fumbled, mumbled Irish accent. The camera lingers on the curve of her cheek and the sheen in her eyes, but in the end it's hopeless.This movie adheres pretty slavishly to the classic romcom roadtrip plotline (spoiled rich girl meets cynical laconic man who falls for her during the course of numerous plot twists and reversals). Since It Happened One Night there have been probably dozens of retellings, including in Bollywood. Some of them felt quite fresh at the time (such as A Sure Thing, in 1985, with John Cusack at the height of his ragged, boyish charm).
Perhaps the only thing different here was that the female lead gets most of the screentime. But otherwise predictable, boring, and uninspired. In fact, it seems Matthew Goode went on record as saying that he reckoned this film was the year's worst, and he took the part only as it allowed him to fly back to London on weekends.
What a waste.
1*
2015
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