I’ve walked past this movie countless times in Blockbuster video. I’ve picked it up, thought about it and put it down more times than I care to remember. Despite my liking for Madonna, I’ve always been rather dubious about her acting career, and The Next Best Things didn’t fill me with hope. Then it was reduced to £2.00 for 2 nights and that was that – what’s £2 if a film is shite anyway? Madonna plays Abbie Reynolds, a thirty something yoga instructor who has just finished with her boyfriend. Despite being intelligent, witty and fantastic in the sack, Michael just can’t cope with her possessive, orderly nature and moves out of their apartment. Very upset, ...  Read the complete review

It's Saturday night. Two of the kids are out at the cinema seeing Shrek with their Dad. Little one’s asleep. Big one’s at home and well miffed. How to appease? Answer : omelette and chips, ice-cream and a movie of her choice on Front Row. An idea is born. The Next Best Thing is chosen… We had watched the trailers and agreed this looked the best on offer from the films available. We had considered watching The Story Of Us, but the timings didn’t fit in with the kids being out. So we sat down to be entertained and mesmerised by Madonna and Rupert Everett. This film came out last year, but wasn’t one I’d been ...  Read the complete review

The Next Best Thing Stars Madonna and Rupert Graves as best friends Abby and Robert (characters not to hard to play then). He is gay and she is a yoga teacher who jumps from one bad relationship to another. One night after a few too many martinis they sleep together and then Abby becomes pregnant. They decide to bring the baby up together living in the same house. Everything goes well until Abby gets a nice serious boyfriend. This film was nowhere near as bad as I was expecting and did have some hilarious moments in it but it just didn't hit the mark. I'd wait for it to come on sky . ...  Read the complete review

For its first half, this vehicle for Madonna is a light, unpretentious, genuinely romantic surprise — her best work as a film actress, for my money, since Desperately Seeking Susan in 1985. Having Rupert Everett for a leading man helps. They play a mismatched pair of romantic dreamers (he's gay, she's straight) who accidentally conceive a child one drunken night — he was consoling her over her latest breakup. Director John Schlesinger, working from an original screenplay by Tom Ropelewski, wittily stages this impromptu seduction as a spoof of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers that our leads caper through while house-sitting within reach of an enormous, ..  Read the complete review

Ok, Madonna isn’t the greatest of actresses. I know that. She’s no Meryl Streep, and she’s nowhere near good enough to win an Academy Award. But saying that, she isn’t a bad actress, either. I first saw this film when it came out over three years ago, and remembered very little about it. When I saw it would be premiered over Christmas, I read all the reviews on the film that I could find to make a decision to watch it again, or not. Every single review seemed to focus only on Madonna. Not Madonna’s acting, not Madonna’s character, just Madonna herself. “A few actors star in flops, but only Madonna can do it every time.” one  Read the complete review