BEFORE: Continuing the NYC-based romance chain with this one, which I think is like 10 short films joined together. And while I saw a film earlier this week with my former college roommate Judah Friedlander, this one features a segment directed by my film-school rival, Brett Ratner. Linking from last night's film - Robert De Niro was in "Ronin" with Jean Reno, who was in "The Professional" with Natalie Portman.
THE PLOT: An anthology film joining several love stories set in one of the most loved cities of the world, New York.
AFTER: Yes, New York is a wonderful place - and people interact with people in all sorts of different ways - but I hesitate to call some of these vignettes "love stories". It seemed to me more like stories that shot off in all directions, trying to score a hit in the dark. Half of the stories were met with a "So what?" reponse from me - a man takes his daughter to the park. So what? An older couple goes for a walk. So what?
Two of the stories - the one about the pickpocket and the one about the older singer - just left me confused. And the one about the film composer who is told by a film director to read certain books annoyed me. You know, it's called research, and if you spent half the time reading the books as you did complaining about it, you might get somewhere.
I vowed to never spend any money on a film directed by my college frenemy, Brett Ratner. Which was only tough when he directed one of the "X-Men" movies - since he only directed one segment here, I'm bending my own rules just slightly. And although I heard his segment was controversial and considered in poor taste, at least the story went somewhere, which not all of the segments here did. I still hate his work, but it was slightly better than the average.
I'm grading on a curve tonight and awarding points for effort, but I wish that the segments had united somehow and proven some kind of larger point. Having characters from one segment interact with characters from another doesn't really count as an overall unifying element.
Starring Bradley Cooper (last seen in "Wedding Crashers"), Natalie Portman (last seen in "Closer"), Andy Garcia (last seen in "Stand and Deliver"), Hayden Christensen, Orlando Bloom (last seen in "Black Hawk Down"), Christina Ricci (last seen in "The Ice Storm"), Ethan Hawke (last seen in "Fast Food Nation"), James Caan (last seen in "Honeymoon in Vegas"), Anton Yelchin (last seen in "Terminator Salvation"), Julie Christie (last seen in "Finding Neverland"), Drea De Matteo, John Hurt, Shia LaBeouf, Chris Cooper (last seen in "A Time to Kill"), Robin Wright (last seen in "The Crossing Guard"), Eli Wallach (last seen in "The Two Jakes"), Cloris Leachman, and Maggie Q (last seen in "Live Free or Die Hard").
RATING: 4 out of 10 hot dogs
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