Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Disaster at your local theater: "He's Just Not That Into You"

In the grand tradition of me doing things for the pure absurdity of it, I ventured out to see the brand new chick flick "He's Just Not That Into You" by myself. Being that I was the only male in the packed theater, I just pretended like I had 139 dates who weren't putting out. I'd never actually seen a romantic comedy at a movie theater before, so the "Awwwwwws" from the female audience during every tender fucking moment were almost as entertaining as the film. I also was under the impression that Ryan Reynolds was in the film too...apparently he's not...so I struggled with this bit of reality for most of the picture.

*sigh*

Moving along...

The movie is based on some book by the writers of Sex and the City, and has to do with women trying to understand men and their convoluted agendas. In short, the message is "Men aren't as complicated as you wish they were" and we get 2 hours and 9 minutes of the star studded female cast dealing with it. You're probably still wondering why the fuck I subjected myself to this. Well, the premise of the film starts with "A bunch of shallow twenty-somethings..." and I just couldn't walk away from that. Plus the film takes place in Baltimore, which is the perfect backdrop for unhappy people. Believe me.

A word to women who want to see this movie, or have already seen the movie. Please do not accept the lessons espoused in the film as divine relationship doctrine. Men aren't complicated? Is that a fucking revelation? If you aren't having sex with your boyfriend/husband, do you really have to ask someone else if "something's wrong"? For fuck's sake, swallow your pride and open your eyes. Follow the tried and true Josh-logic. Be fucking honest about how you feel, what you want, and where you think you are going. If you are living in a shiny pink fairyland and have romanticized every aspect of your sex life to a point where it resembles plot lines of your favorite 80s movies and not just 2 people drunk and fucking - you deserve all the heartache, disappointment, and suffering that you bring upon yourself you damn fucking fool.

*ahem*

Thankfully, the movie doesn't derail completely into forced happy endings so every member of the audience leaves the theater with a renewed faith in humanity. Some characters break up and stay broken up, are forced to pick up their shattered little lives, and deal with the consequences of being too fucking naive. That's only some characters. A few get the hackneyed Hollywood treatment, complete with super-creative marriage proposals that evoked a deafening "AWWWWWWWW" from my estrogen dominated audience. That really was the toughest part to stomach. The concept of marriage is damned by this movie at first, but then it does a complete about face and shoved down our throats as the logical progression of truly 'happy' relationships. That little bit of horseshit almost made me forget about the lecture that was the rest of the film. Telling me how I act as a guy. Let me just say, NEVER IN MY FUCKING LIFE HAS A WOMAN COMPLAINED TO ME ABOUT GIVING MIXED SIGNALS, BEING LED ON, OR UNFAIR TREATMENT. Apparently though, not every man on this planet is as brutally awesome as me - so if some of the aspects of this film's characters apply to you (if you're a guy) or a guy you know, please beat him in the face with a rusty rake.

The one saving grace of this cinematic experiences was a cameo by Kris Kristopherson as Jennifer Anniston's father. KRIS FUCKING KRISTOPHERSON. The most grizzled man alive. I'd pay money just to watch him eat a steak.