MADE OF HONOR HAS NO HONOR
I’m not some hero hipster good at mocking romantic comedies. I have a deep-seated love of craptastic film. But the key part of that word is “tastic.” For me to see a movie with some problems, and, yes, to even buy that crummy movie; there has to be some ‘tastic. I will watch craptastic whether it be action, comedy, romance, western, period pieces and, of course, musicals. By the way, if you want to one-stop shop fulfill that list – get yourself a copy of “Mortal Kombat”. For complete closure, if this dissertation needs defending, add a copy of Elvis’s Flaming Star and live unchallenged.
At the first glimpse of the print advertising, I thought that “Made of Honor” might be craptastic. By the time I saw the trailer I knew it would be “My Best Friend’s Wedding” without the “message.”
See, the film industry knows that we all bring a full complement of emotional baggage to every movie we see. And they think they’ve categorized that emotional baggage.
“Made of Honor” makes me think that the movie industry thinks that I’m an asshole. This has made me decide that they’re the ones that are assholes, and that the romantic comedy portion of the movie industry is morally bankrupt.
Patrick Dempsey is a swinging, swinging bachelor in “Made of Honor”. He’s been friends with Michelle Monaghan for 10 years. When she meets another guy and gets engaged she asks Dempsey to be her “maid” of honor. He decides to go to the wedding so that he can screw it up and have a shot at her himself— making him the worst “friend” ever.
The plot that “friends” should, by rights, be together romantically was lame when I was 13 and I read it in every Harlequin Romance. Instinctively, everyone knows that there is a window of romance when you meet someone. If you miss it you have to wait, Brigadoon like, for it to come back. If your friend finds love with someone else in the foggy times – you are screwed and must, traditionally, wait until your friend’s spouse dies and then you can try again. That’s the rule. I don’t make the rules and I only follow the ones that are immutable. Like this one.
The dirt-bag plot of “Made of Honor” wants me to like a character who tricks his best friend out of new found love for his own gain. It’s not like he’s spent the 10 years pining; he’s slept with, and been a jackass to, every orifice he could get into around town. If you’ve written a movie where I’m supposed to back the monster – you better create one likeable monster. What has been done, can be done. Frankenstein, for example.
I have watched many a craptastic film with an unlikable hero or heroine that finds redemption: Rock Hudson in “Pillow Talk”, Bill Murray in “Groundhog Day”, etc. These are stories of bad people that meet a good person and change because of love. Oh, I’m into that. That’s just good movie times in my opinion.
See, if you’ve just met someone and your actions are crazy, desperate or jackassy I cut you more movie slack. Jean Arthur in “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town” has a job where she’s an asshole and has to come to realize that her actions are thwarting love. She realizes she’s an asshole, she changes and they get together in the end. Hoo-freaking-ray.
If there must be a last minute wedding to thwart, let us look to Katharine Hepburn in “Bringing Up Baby”. She attributes her horrible yet wacky actions on panic because Cary Grant’s wedding was imminent and she’d just met him. An added bonus is that the woman Cary Grant is supposed to marry is so obviously wrong for him. Wrong like Daniel Day Lewis in “A Room with a View”. Another fine example of a movie wedding that needed to be canceled. And it was; with style and panache.
“My Best Friend’s Wedding” was crummy, but at least it didn’t have the jerkoff win in the end. Where the hell is the Hay’s Code when you need it?
Jackie Kashian
CLICK HERE TO BUY JACKIE KASHIAN’S COMEDY CD CIRCUS PEOPLE
