Wedding blahs

>>Made of Honor is a pointless,
robotic romantic comedy

MARRIAGE MISCARRIAGE:
Patrick Dempsey and Michelle Monaghan

by MARK SLUTSKY

Now I like a good romantic comedy just as much as the next red-blooded, heterosexual male film critic. Deployed correctly, the rom-com can be one of the most light and enjoyable of movie genres, but done poorly, it’s one of the most depressing. When audience wish-fulfilment and aspirational lifestyle kitsch is as transparent and robotic as it is in Made of Honor, directed by Paul Weiland (Leonard Part 6, City Slickers 2… no comment) it feels particularly pointless and desperate. A good rom-com will make the characters (and the audience, following along) flout probability and realistic behaviour, jumping through hoops without actually showing them. In Made of Honor, they smack you in the face.

Get a load of this guy, the hero of this movie, played by Patrick “McDreamy” Dempsey. He’s a ridiculously wealthy guy who invented the ring around coffee cups that keeps you from burning your hands, and thus doesn’t need to ever work. He beds a different, model-hot woman every night. He’s got a cool NYC pad with a gigantic deck and neon art on his wall. He’s McDreamy, for crying out loud. Thing of it is, he’s just coming around to realizing he might as well shack up with his BFF (Michelle Monaghan) because they get along so well—and she’s just come back from a trip to Scotland with a fiancé (Kevin McKidd of HBO’s Rome).

We’re supposed to identify with this guy? We’re supposed to feel for his predicament? Are you kidding me? What possible investment could I, as a moviegoer who trekked down to the movie theatre on a rainy Monday night with a hole in my sock, have in the romantic fortunes of this smug, entitled douchebag? Frankly, I felt Monaghan would be much better off with McKidd, who seems way cooler.

Basically, this movie is the inverse of the much, much better My Best Friend’s Wedding, with the genders switched and without the gay friend and ambiguous ending. The leads have no chemistry, it isn’t very funny (one chuckle, one guffaw and three grins, by my count, and that’s including the jokes in the trailer), “made of honor” doesn’t even make sense as a phrase, and it is definitely a waste of your time.

Made of Honor opens
this Friday, May 2

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