BEFORE: OK, now I'm getting into it, with divorce and flings with large age differences, let's hit one with some more affairs in it while I'm at it. Daniel Eric Gold carries over from "Hello I Must Be Going".
THE PLOT: The story follows a married couple, apart for one night while the husband takes a business trip with a colleague to whom he's attracted. While he's resisting temptation, his wife encounters her past love.
AFTER: There's just not a lot here, it's a pretty simple film about two married people who happen to get tempted to cheat at the same time. People often talk about the "seven year itch" but this couple's only been married for three - perhaps they were together for four years before that? It's a bit unclear. But it's a bit of a contrivance that the husband goes on a business trip with an attractive co-worker, and the wife just HAPPENS to bump into her old boyfriend on the street the same day her husband leaves. What are the odds of that? Consider that her old boyfriend is from France, so he just HAPPENS to be visiting NYC that same day? And he bumps into her within hours of her husband going on this trip? It's possible that maybe he was stalking her, or watching and waiting for the husband to go out of town? Just looking for an explanation here that explains the coincidence.
This business trip is in Philadelphia, which is less than 100 miles away from NYC. It's a short drive or train trip - and the husband is out of town for just ONE night. So you have to figure, if they're both tempted to cheat during just one night apart, maybe that marriage isn't on very solid ground to begin with. Right? And it's just a day after Joanna, the wife, first meets Laura, her husband's co-worker at a party. Joanna wonders why her husband never mentioned that he had such an attractive co-worker - well, that's a question that really answers itself. Either he just didn't see his co-worker that way, or he didn't want his wife flipping out over the fact that he has such an attractive co-worker, duh.
It's tough to say whether Joanna's jealousy played a part in her deciding to go to dinner with her ex - let's assume that it did. And it's also tough to say whether Joanna's jealousy ended up driving Michael closer to his co-worker, but again, let's assume that it did. So one thing leads to another, and before long they're both hanging out with other partners, wondering what the implications are if they cheat. Can they cheat and get away with it? Should they? Joanna's kind of got the advantage here, because I think she got with the French guy while she and Michael were "on a break". That's not cheating, but if she never told Michael about her feelings for Alex, it's a lie of omission. And clearly Joanna has emotional feelings for Alex still, which is worse than having sex with him, in some way. Sort of.
Joanna and Alex have dinner with his friends, they walk a friend's dog, they get locked out, and they kiss each other. Meanwhile Michael and Laura share a drink at a bar, kiss and then decide to go swimming in the hotel pool. I won't get into whether either partner has sex, because that's really the crux of the film. But by getting intimate with other partners, sharing their feelings, their stories, and kissing or embracing, isn't that all a form of cheating? Sex is sex, of course, but they've made emotional connections with other people, so it almost doesn't matter.
But for the most part, this is very boring stuff - who knew that affairs could be so boring? The married people are so hung up on all the implications that I don't think they could even enjoy the best part of the affairs, if you know what I mean. And then just when it looks like there's going to be a confrontation brewing over the whole thing, the film just ends, which is a choice, but maybe a really bad one. Imagine a film about a war that details all the build-up and then ends before the first shot gets fired. What a let-down.
One part that was very confusing was the fact that while Joanna was hanging out with Alex, after dinner they were in a very different apartment than the one she shares with Michael - I kept thinking, that's not the same kitchen we saw before! What the hell? Does their apartment have two kitchens? It took me a while to realize that was someone else's apartment, and they were just there to walk Joanna's friend's dog.
Anyway, this one is short, not-so-sweet and ends before it gets to the point - don't say I didn't warn you about that. This film had the bad fortune to be set for release in March 2010, which was right around the time that Miramax was closing down (not because of the accusations against Harvey Weinstein, this was 7 years before that...). This was Miramax going bankrupt after screwing up distribution on several pictures, and then other companies got to bid on all their unreleased projects and take them over.
Also starring Keira Knightley (last seen in "Domino"), Sam Worthington (last seen in "Man on a Ledge"), Eva Mendes (last seen in "Clear History"), Guillaume Canet (last heard in "The Little Prince"), Anson Mount (last seen in "City by the Sea"), Griffin Dunne (last seen in "Adrienne"), Stephanie Romanov (last seen in "The Final Cut"), Scott Adsit (last seen in "Town & Country"), Justine Cotsonas, Karen Pittman (last seen in "The Rewrite"), Rae Ritke, Chriselle Almeida, Zach Poole, Christian Lorentzen, William Clemente, Cheryl Sarkaria.
RATING: 5 out of 10 nights sleeping on the sofa
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