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Americas Sweethearts
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Release
Date: 19th October 2001
Distributor: Columbia Tristar
Certificate: 15
Starring: Julia Roberts, Billy Crystal,
John Cusack, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Hank Azaria, Christopher Walken, Seth
Green, Alan Arkin
Director: Joe
Roth
Running Time:
102
mins
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For
Kiki (Roberts), being the personal assistant to her sister, the beautiful
megastar Gwen (Zeta-Jones) isn't easy. In fact, it's nearly impossible since
the man of her dreams is Eddie (Cusack), Gwen's estranged husband. The job
gets even harder when Kiki is given the monumental task of helping Gwen
and Eddie make it through a movie press junket organized by publicity exec
Lee Phillips (Crystal), lured out of retirement to have a go at publicising
the last film they made together. Eddie and Gwen are the Hollywood couple
that people want to know everything about, their lives, their impressive
careers and now their upcoming divorce
Unfortunately there's no love lost between these "Sweethearts",
after nine hit movies together and a calamitous 18-month separation prompted
by Gwen's affair with her Spanish co-star, Hector (Hank Azaria).
And Kiki has always been pushed into the background. But at this junket,
that's all going to change. Eddie will soon be fair game and Kiki will do
whatever it takes to get his attention. |
'America's
Sweethearts' is a biting satire of the whole movie industry and of press
junkets in particular. Director Joe Roth has been a studio boss himself,
having run both Fox and Disney, and he brings to this film an inside knowledge
of just the sort of things that we all thought went on (but were afraid
to believe).
Eddie and Gwen are shown in scenes from several "films" that they
have appeared in, a sports weepie called "Requiem for an Outfielder"
and a courtroom melodrama called "The Bench," and both of them
come off looking just like real films (and so they should with the behind
the scenes talent employed). Both the leading ladies shine here, especially
Roberts, cast against type as a bit of an ugly duckling, especially looking
several stones heavier in flashback sequences… |
| But
the romantic spark between Roberts and Cusack is not there and there scenes
have to be reinforced by some excellent supporting characters including
Seth Green, as Lee's slimy sidekick, and Christopher Walken as the movie's
eccentric director who refuses to show the finished product to anyone but
the press (God bless him). |
| John
Cusack's career took off when together with some high school friends he
started a film company, New Crime Productions. New Crime's first feature
was the sharply written comedy 'Grosse Pointe Blank' (1997), which he co-scripted,
and starred in as a world-weary hitman who goes home for his 10-year high
school reunion and tries to rekindle a romance with the girl he stood up
on prom night (Minnie Driver). He followed that up with 'Con Air' (1997),
and 'Being John Malkovich' (1999). But it was in 'High Fidelity' (2000),
an adaptation of Nick Hornby's popular novel, that he really came into his
own, co-starring with, among others, Catherine Zeta-Jones. |
