Director: Brad Silberling
Release Year: 1998
Runtime: 1h 54min
Do you think actors are ever embarrassed by the movies they make? I can’t imagine Nicolas Cage sitting around with a bunch of his guy friends, drinking beers and showing them this piece of crap movie and actually having the balls to ask them what they though of it. If there was ever a movie that tried to create the ultimate “chick flick,” this would be it. The entire movie is shot in hazy, soft-focus and features two pop love songs that dominated the charts for what seemed like years. Mix in a Nick Cage, who looks half asleep the entire movie, and a desperate woman heart surgeon (Meg Ryan), who somehow can’t get a date with a human being, and you have yourself the beginnings of a sappy chick flick.
This director actually had the nerve to stick in several musical montages that last for a couple of minutes each and contain nothing more than sad people looking out windows. This is what I would call a movie to do dishes by. I mean, forget the ridiculous plot that makes no sense and some of the worst acting by Nicholas Cage I have ever seen perpetrated on the American public, (how did this guy win an Academy Award?) I still can’t believe the ending they made us sit through. You can see it coming from a million miles away, but you just keep saying to yourself, no, no, they’re not going to do that, they’re not. . . and they do it.
And that’s the reason this film even gets one star, because they did the thing you would never think this film would do — something original, something shocking, something that in retrospect I admire, yet am completely dumbfounded by. Well, if you have two hours to waste and feel like watching a movie while paying bills, brushing your dog or washing out your silk boxers, this is the movie for you. If you get it, please let me know.
