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Bad acting sinks rom-com...
> Every Jack has a Jill
2 stars (out of 5)
Director: Jennifer Devoldère
Cast: Mélanie Laurent, Justin Bartha, Valérie Benguigui, Billy Boyd, Maurice Bénichou, Géraldine Nakache, Yvon Back
Rating: (M)
Chloe (Mélanie Laurent) and Jack (Justin Bartha), live relatively benign and unfulfilling lives on either side of the Atlantic.
Parisian Chloé is single and splits her time between a few annoying acquaintances, while 30-year-old American Jack has just been dumped by his girlfriend.
When Jack wins a free trip to Paris with one of the many product-placement references to Coke, it doesn't take a Mensa candidate to figure out where this is headed.
The only thing holding up the "will they or won't they?" question is a dubious plot involving lost luggage, quirky French hoteliers and a well-thumbed edition of Gabriel Garcia Marquez' 100 Years of Solitude.
With a half-decent script, you can forgive many things, but bad acting is not one of them.
Justin Bartha's character is just so one-dimensional that he doesn't deserve to meet a pretty French girl.
Laurent pretty much carries the better sequences with her slightly eccentric mannerisms and whimsical romantic imaginings. With a patent French aesthetic brought to her parts, it's almost as if Every Jack has a Jill was conceived as two distinct films that had the misfortune to get accidentally spliced together.
Never quite knowing whether it is supposed to be French or American, Every Jack has a Jill is cast adrift somewhere in the middle.
Best thing: It goes for only 80 minutes.
Worst thing: The subtitles, unless your French is good; reading white text against white backgrounds can make life rather difficult.
See it with: A die-hard fan of rom-coms.
- Mark Orton.