Even Aniston's Bum Couldn't Save Them (Movie only) (The Break Up (DVD))

Member Name: marandina

Product:	The Break Up (DVD)
Date:	21/05/07 (508 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Mildly watchable

Disadvantages: Anti-climax at the end

If there’s one movie genre I struggle with it’s anything remotely in chick flick territory. I guess you’d officially label this as comedy/romance but where a movie descends into male-female relationships with a view to appealing to a man’s feminine side then I’m strictly offside. It’s not that I’m particularly macho but simply that the films are usually pants. So when I sat down to watch the Jennifer Aniston/Vince Vaughn vehicle “The Break Up” released in 2006 I considered this a big risk for the 105 minute run time. Then again, I did just sit through the recent re-make of “Lassie” so maybe I’m kidding myself that I’m swayed by fantasy/horror movies only, after all.

Gary Grobowski (Vince Vaughn) and Brooke Meyers (Jennifer Aniston) meet at a baseball game and decide to date. Eventually moving into a trendy Chicago condo together, they fall out after a dinner party for their respective families and decide to go their separate ways after a bit of a row. As Gary descends into a couch potato existence of video games, baseball on TV and general slobishness, Brooke decides to show Gary the error of his ways and engages in a not so subtle psychological warfare designed to get her man back, The trouble is, Gary is an obstinate Polack who refuses to be moved, regardless of how outrageous Brooke gets in her methods. Will they get back together or is their relationship consigned to the latest break up statistics?

As you would expect from two major leads, Aniston and Vaughn do a professional job as the fighting couple. Fuelled by their off-screen relationship of the time, both manage to convince the audience that they really do loathe and love each other in equal measure, often reflected in a genuine flash of anger and occasional look of longing. For me, Vaughn is something of an enigma; I'm sure we've yet to see the best of him. Set up in an awful role in "Dodgeball", he was at his his best in "Wedding Crashers" and has a unique aspect to his gentle comedy that makes him so marketable and yet prone to lame scripts. The strength of the movie lies in the dialogue shaped by the screenplay by Jeremy Garelick and Jay Lavender. In their ongoing battle of wills, we recognise our own weaknesses in moments of failing to see the other person’s point of view, with cross purposes fueling a special kind of madness. All of the archetypal sparks of antagonism are there including the pool table drafted in to the condo, much to the girl’s chagrin, dating other men to make her man jealous and through it all the unraveling realisation that maybe the other person is the one that you’ve been looking for all along. Support is strong for the two leads. Judy Davis is suitably flaky as the owner of the Art Gallery where Brooke works while John Michael Higgins is just plain strange as the acipello-centric brother of Brooke.

Peyton Reed directs and often relies on close shots to emphasise mood and the interplay between the two leads, luring the audience into a fly-on-the-wall feeling of watching a relationship fall apart. We do get to empathise with the leads through the visual context of their respective places of work. Brooke works in an Art Gallery bringing into play the theatrical owner, the presumably gay, male receptionist and the incursion of the devilishly handsome art buyer who provides one of the various distractions aimed at making Gary jealous. Meanwhile, Gary’s tour bus operation in Chicago with his other brothers is the scene of long standing Oedipus angst. The movie also has a great musical score featuring songs from Queen, Heatwave, Alanis Morissette and Johnny Nash amongst others.

Where the movie falls down is in its failure to make us care enough about the characters. It’s hard to empathise with Gary as he’s just a chauvinist on the surface whilst Brooke seems too hung up on wanting a perfect relationship whilst rarely articulating the reasons why Gary hasn’t shown that he cares enough for her. In fact, Aniston’s role looks merely like an extension of her lucrative soap role of Rachel in "Friends", what with the same raised eyebrows, anxious tone of voice and smug self-assuredness that the rest of the world simply must find her attractive. In one scene where she gets waxed and walks from her bedroom to the kitchen and back, apparently buck-naked, with Gary playing his video games, we get a generous view of the Aniston backside which is one of the high points of the movie (it must be said), so nearly pulling the film back from the brink of mediocrity . Sadly, however, even this doesn’t save the project from banality and the closing reels confirm that lack of direction for the film at large as the movie ends in anti-climax.

“The Break Up” is rated 12A and with adult themes it will appeal to older teenagers and adults who like romantic comedies/chick flicks with a modern feel. With up to date dialogue, quick fire scenes that are intended to make the run time punchy and a glamorous cast, this movie has all the hall marks of a top class movie. Sadly, it falls on the sword of modern day realism that fails to transport the audience into either a far away place of movie escapism or a celluloid journey of stoical fatalism. Somewhere along the way, it fell between the two and…well… broke up.

Thanks for the read

Mara.

DVD available from Amazon from £13.48

More info at www.thebreakupmovie.net

Summary: Overview of "The Break Up"