J L-H can Break my Heart any Day... (Heartbreakers (DVD))

Member Name: a-true-ben

Product:	Heartbreakers (DVD)
Date:	13/08/06 (121 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Some intriguing plot twists, humour and sexiness

Disadvantages: Loose ends, average acting, not very funny or plausible

As I've said before, I often use online reviews to plan what films I watch on TV. This time I didn't see the trailer until quite short notice, and didn't have time. I wish I had, because it might have saved me two not particularly amusing hours of my life…

It looked so promising. Sigourney Weavers as Max Conners, Jennifer Love Hewitt as her daughter Page, Ray Liotta as Dean Cumanno and Gene Hackman as William B. Tensy. With those big names, it couldn't go far wrong could it? Think again!

The movie opens with the wedding night of Max (Weaver) and Dean (Liotta), but when Dean goes into work the next morning, he ends up cheating on his new wife straight away with seductive secretary Wendy. Cue instant $300,000 divorce. We soon find, however, the whole thing was a set up. Wendy was in fact Max's daughter Page, and the two women seem to have made a career seducing men in this way. Max is able to lure wealthy businessmen into marriage within three months, then Page sets it up to look like they're cheating, and the two of them split the settlement.

In fact, we find the two women don't even seem to have much need of the money anyway - they have other cons to get free food, petrol, hotel rooms… These two are devious. And the name 'Conners', surely a joke! (They in fact use a variety of names and identities throughout the film)

It's a fairly interesting premise, but I did find it a bit implausible. How many really wealthy businessmen would marry someone they've only known three months without even a pre-nuptial contract?

The whole thing seems to rely on a few too many coincidences. I'm amazed no one gets suspicious. Hotels believe they've mysteriously 'lost reservations'. Right at the start, Dean believes Max is a virgin on their wedding night - but doesn't think it the slightest strange when she promises to do all kinds of kinky things to him, like she knows what she's doing. There were other loose ends - what happened to William? - but I don't want to give away any spoilers should you decide to watch the film (despite my review).

In a good film, you get carried through all these worries by suspension of disbelief. In this case, it didn't quite happen. Although the film wasn't exactly ruined, I did find these nagging doubts distracting me though.

The two central characters just didn't seem believable to me. That's not a condemnation of the acting (not that it was that good either), I just couldn't believe some of the things in this film could possibly be real.

It's interesting to compare the styles of the two lead ladies, however. Jennifer Love Hewitt has a great body, and she makes the most of it with short skirts and push up bras. While she's passable in the average Rom Com or teen slasher movie, she can't *act* sexy though. Her 'seduction' is blatant, and while I can see how she'd inspire lust, there wasn't any chemistry between her and Jack, and I don't see how he fell in love with her (especially given the way she treats him).

Weaver, on the other hand, is too old for me, but I admit looking good for her age. It's amazing how she doesn't look like Ripley (from the Alien series), and she did the best job of acting seductively. The contest between the two to get a man to buy them a drink shows that her older head knows the tricks. I'd heard Weaver was looking for sexier roles, and didn't like being typecast in butch Ripley-type parts. I don't know whether that was in reference to this film or not, but perhaps the only reason she took this one was desperation for such a role!

As I said, I came to the movie without any preconceptions about what kind of film it was. I assumed for most of it, it was a rather bad drama/romance. In fact, it seems it was supposed to be a comedy! Well, it was certainly too light-hearted and cheesy to be a serious drama, but there wasn't much evidence of it being funny either. The situations were often a bit funny, as in strange, but rarely as in 'ha ha'. I admit I did laugh at a few of the obviously so-intended moments, but I was always wondering if I was laughing AT the film rather than with it.

It's not a film without any redeeming qualities by any means. After all, it sufficiently intrigued me to watch until the end - albeit partly out of morbid fascination. Although I thought there were numerous loose ends, and parts that just didn't work right, there were also amusing episodes. Indeed, the last half-hour or so was a marked improvement, and somewhat justified my perseverance. There were a number of quotable one-liners towards the end, and the plot twists (with plenty of double double-crossing) kept me guessing until the end - so I could hardly say this film was predictable.

I'm not usually that fussy about films, but I wouldn't recommend this one. I didn't feel immensely tortured, but I could've done something a lot better with two hours and three minutes of my life (plus ad breaks on Channel 4)

It's rated 15 in the UK. It's actually lower rated in most other countries (e.g. PG-13 in USA) but does have some bad language and lots of sexual suggestion. You never see anything happen though.

http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0125022/

Summary: Nice to look at, but poor story and performances let it down