Heartbreakers (Heartbreakers (DVD))

Member Name: eddie7sf

Product:	Heartbreakers (DVD)
Date:	15/02/05 (69 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Excellent chemistry between cast., Makes the odd serious point., Simple enjoyable fluff.

Disadvantages: Too much reliance on cleavage., Nothing new here., Liotta out of place.

Never in my life have I seen a film that depends so much on the breasts of it's stars. Each scene seems to feature more cleavage than the last, to the point where at the end it's amazing they are still bothering with clothes at all. This is obviously shamelessly done to pull in the male audience to what will be regarded by them as a "chick flick", but it's a shame that it distracts the viewer away from the film itself, which amongst all of it's cliches does actually have some intelligent comments to make.

Heartbreakers focuses on a mother and daughter con-team. The mother, Max (Sigourney Weaver) spends months in relationships with men until they marry her. Her daughter, Paige (Jennifer Love Hewitt) then enters the picture and seduces the man, and they are convieniantly caught by Max, resulting in a large divorce settlement. As usual in these films, they need "one last big score" after the IRS threatens them, meaning they go after ailing billionaire William Tensy (Gene Hackman), all while being pursued by the previous man they ripped off (Ray Liotta). It's obvious where most of this is leading if you've seen this type of film before, so don't expect any big surprises here.

What is surprising though, is how well a lot of the elements work. The cast are all appealing enough, including some gloriously over the top performances. Weaver's Russian 'character' Ulga falls easily into this, as is Hackman's Tensy, who is so absurdly ridiculous that it goes past unbelivable, all the while being entertaining. Hewitt is appealing enough for what she has to do, which is pretty much just stand around in the tightest or smallest clothing available. Jason Lee (as the man Paige tries to con) is excellent in a rare mainstream role as well. Another great benefit of the casting is the way in which they all seem to click together so well. Weaver and Hewitt have excellent chemistry with each other, bouncing lines off each other as a real mother and daughter would. It's a credit to the casting that this also extends to most of the other actors in the film. It's only reall Ray Liotta that feels out of place here, and while not directly bad, seems like he is acting in a different film.

The film moves forward at a reasonable enough pace, although some parts do drag on a bit. This is mostly demonstrated in Hewitt's scenes, which often seem entirely unecessary, but are left in the film for purely visual purposes. You'll find nothing new here story wise either. It's all very much by the numbers filmmaking, the kind of thing where if you've seen one film of this type, you've seen them all. This isn't to say it isn't entertaining, just don't go in expecting a cinematic masterpiece.

All of this, however, does overwhealm the occasional serious observation that the film has on relationships. Several ruminations on love here show that the writers weren't just basing the entire film on one joke, and there is one excellent scene between Hewitt and Lee where she lambasts him for only offering to buy her a drink because of her looks. As she observes, for all he knows, she "could be the antichrist, or have the intelligence of a thermos, but unfortunately those aren't the matters that the male penis ponders." The punchline in this of course that he is the bartender, but it doesn't make the comment any less apt in a general sense.

Heartbreakers is far from being a great film, and I very much doubt that it would hold up at all on repeated viewings. However, it is the kind of fun fluff that one can easily watch the once when they just want something simple and not too taxing, and most will probably find something that appeals here. The fact the ending can be seen a mile off is not the point here, it's that the route to get there is actually kind of fun.

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