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True story. Earlier today, my girlfriend and I went to the movies, and after we finished seeing A.I. (see review), decided we were going to be brash and daring, and sneak into the theater next door for the showing of AMERICA'S SWEETHEARTS. Exhibit A: I've been fighting a cold or allergies or something for a week or so now. Exhibit B: It was freezing in the theater, and I was just wearing shorts and a t-shirt. Exhibit C: Your modern multiplex, with an average of ten to twelve theaters capable of seating about 250 people each for upwards of six showings per theater per day, is little more than a thick-carpeted bacterial minefield where the lucky get away with the common cold, and the unlucky? Well, in the early 21st century, cholera's gotta go somewhere.

Anyway, long story short, I left AMERICA'S SWEETHEARTS with itchy, sticky, pink eyes, and a desire to kill, or at least write an unfavorable review on the website. Those other factors notwithstanding, I can unequivocally blame AMERICA'S SWEETHEARTS for giving me pinkeye. And that's the nicest thing I can say about it.

AMERICA'S SWEETHEARTS is a "side-splitting romp", an "endearing romance which will sweep you away", and a "hilarious, often shockingly incisive satire of contemporary pop culture and the society in love with it." Sorry, I just did that in the interest of fuelling the growing popularity of our site by tossing out a couple of print-and-tv-ad-ready quotes.

Now for the honest truth. AMERICA'S SWEETHEARTS is "crap."

The "sweethearts" of the title are feuding movie stars Eddie (John Cusack, who deserves better) and Gwen (Catherine Zeta-Jones, who doesn't), who have lit America (the "America" of the title) on fire with their riotously successful movies, based on their winning real-life chemistry. Like if there had been ten SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLEs. Or if anybody besides the DangerSeekers had liked the movies Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger did together.

This is all transmitted in the first ninety seconds of a movie that dedicates its first fifteen minutes to setting up the highest high-concept plot since maybe SPEED like so many popsicle sticks in a shitty summer camp arts'n'crafts project, the construction of which would've been more entertaining to watch than this movie. Then again, having snuck in, I did get to see this for free, so I shouldn't complain. Then again, this movie gave me pinkeye, so here goes:

Okay, Eddie and Gwen have one last movie in post-production, but the movie's director (Christopher Walken) is crazy and is holding the reels hostage until the movie's press junket. Now, the fussy, not-especially-bright studio head (Stanley Tucci) re-hires the recently fired studio publicist Lee Philips (co-writer Billy Crystal) to get the leads back together to help sell the movie which will tank if a.) they can't wrest it away from the director and b.) the public doesn't believe Eddie & Gwen are back together.

The problem? Gwen hates Eddie, and blames her for having tried to kill her by launching his motorcycle through a restaurant window and into the table she was sharing with her new lover, Hector (Hank Azaria in maybe the most ethnically stereotyped role since Fisher Stevens' Ben from the SHORT CIRCUIT movies), and Eddie, totally unhinged by the split-up, has retreated to a New Age clinic, where he receives supposedly funny advice from a mindless guru (Alan Arkin; of course I appreciate the irony of Cusack again taking advice from his GROSSE POINTE BLANK shrink, but I'd appreciate it more if, like that incisive comedy, this time around were at all funny).

Lee sweet-talks both of them into venturing out to the junket by playing on each one's blind spots (Eddie's obsessive love for Gwen) and insecurities (Gwen's concern over her flagging solo career), and ...

You know what? I'm done flogging the plot of the piece of crap that's gonna make me have to call in sick and dose myself with antibiotic eyedrops for the next month. If you've seen the trailer, you know what happens - Eddie falls out of love with Gwen by falling in love with her sister/assistant Kiki (Julia Roberts), a decision documented in the pages of the medical journal "Duh". Thank you, Norm MacDonald, wherever you are, for lettting me steal your joke.

Plot recapped, let me get to really ragging on this flick. I have the utmost respect for, like, ninety percent of this cast. John Cusack is a black-comedic genius with a unique edge which makes you hope he was drawn to this project for some noble purpose like building an addition on his house or something; Julia Roberts is a commodity with no parallel in the modern movie industry, and not many in the past; supporting players like Azaria and Seth Green (here underused as Crystal's protege) are capable of making comedic sustenance out of almost anything and everything. And in SWEETHEARTS, they're all either miscast, misused, or utterly misguided. Cusack, long the darkhorse of the mainstream movie world, is too smart, too offbeat, and, quite frankly, not good looking enough to convincingly play the premiere A-list movie star lunk in any America like our own. The notion that anybody could spend time in a room with Julia Roberts and not find everybody else in said room swiftly blending into the wallpaper is so ridiculous it makes me want to kick Billy Crystal in the balls. Then again, that's something I've wanted to do since ANALYZE THIS.

And now, I'd like to discuss Catherine Zeta-Jones. I. Hate. Catherine. Zeta. Jones. Y'know, a couple years ago, when she was in THE MASK OF ZORRO, I gotta say, I found her breathtakingly beautiful. And as for her acting talent? Well, I found her breathtakingly beautiful. And that's the best I ever thought of her, in what has turned out to be the all-time-high of my opinion of Catherine Zeta-Jones. She has officially outstayed her welcome with me, and it would be a-okay with me if she were to devote more time to being the "mother and wife first" she insists she is in every interview she gives and absolutely less time toward being a drastically subpar actress with less of a sense of how to give a good line reading than she has a sense of humor.

Under the direction of Revolution Studios chief Joe Roth (who seems to have taken a directorial page from a RUNAWAY BRIDE-era Garry Marshall), SWEETHEARTS can't decide what to be - a screwball farce, a romantic comedy, or a Hollywood satire, and succeeds at none of them. Seriously, everytime the movie descends into hammy physical shtick or toothless movie parody, I silently prayed for the scene to end, usually a good thirty seconds to a minute before it did. Crystal and writing partner Peter Tolan's script tries with such visible strain to find humor in the following topics: 1) Gwen's hyper-aggressive German Shepherd with a penchant for sniffing Lee's crotch; 2) Julia Roberts in a mid-sized fat-suit (at least Friends has the balls, in their recurring flashbacks, to go the distance and put Courteney Cox in a fat-suit the size of Montana); 3) Walken's superfreaky director (basically, just Walken being Walken) who has bought and had transplanted to his estate the Unabomber's shack. These are, unfortunately, the comedic high-points of the movie, too, and each of them is a pretty sizeable misfire, playing out with all the wit of a Gallagher routine.

Of course, the audience I saw it with was enthralled, laughing at every Lucyesque turn, but then again, they paid for it, so they had motivation. I didn't pay for it, and I got struck down with an infection as a result of it. My worst fear, of course, is that the pinkeye is going to seal my eyes shut, and this'll have been the last movie I'll ever see. There are worse fates than having to sit through AMERICA'S SWEETHEARTS, but having it be your lasting impression of the movie industry or the cinematic art? That's Hell itself.

MARY PICKFORD WAS NOT HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS FILM
by jim

"America's Sweethearts" is the story of America's favorite couple, Eddie Thomas (John Cusack) and Gwen Harrison (Catherine Zeta-Jones), and how they break up and endanger the success of their final project together. The reason it's destined for failure is that the American public doesn't want to see a movie starring the two of them when they aren't really together. Something like that. Doesn't make a whole lot of sense. I can actually think of precious few films starring real life couples that made very much money at the box office. "Eyes Wide Shut"? "The Getaway"? Not exactly blockbusters. Anyway, somehow these guys have made like one million movies together. Judging from the clips they show in the movie they all sucked really bad. I'll never figure why every time a movie shows a fictional movie inside it, they insist on making it really cheesy and dumb. Then again, this movie was written by two people who aren't particularly funny. At least not anymore.

Despite the weak script by Billy Crystal and Peter Tolan, the film manages some degree of charm. You can thank the (mostly) stellar cast for that fact. Julia Roberts is beaming and radiant and irresistible, as always. She plays Kiki, the formerly fat sister of megabitch movie star Gwen. She gives Kiki layers that I doubt were so well fleshed out in the script. She, like co-stars Cusack, Seth Green and Christopher Walken, make the most of the outdated writing. Walken runs wild as the renegade director of the film within a film and Seth Green continues to set himself apart from the other actors of his generation with his vastly underwritten performance as a budding, yet blissfully stupid, studio exec. It's a little hard, in theory, to imagine John Cusack as America's leading leading man, but the talented actor pulls it off. Helping him achieve that goal is that the we only see what he's like after the fall of the relationship. He really only every has to play the neurotic, obsessive wreck that his romantic hero has become.

Now the downside, first and foremost the blame falls on Billy Crystal. He plays ousted studio exec Lee Phillips the same way he plays every role of late, as Billy Crystal. It's as if his "Analyze This" shrink simply changed his name and profession, perhaps in fear of Mafia retribution of some kind. He pulls triple duty, acting as producer and writer as well. The script is full amateurish dick and balls jokes. Stuff that seems like it would have been considered funny at some point in history, but for the life of me I can't imagine when. Anytime the film attempts to be funny (with it's constant and obvious set-ups) it fails. Usually, it is salvaged on the strength of it's stars. Ah, the word usually. Here that "usually" applies almost directly to the horribly untalented Catherine Zeta-Jones. She is high on my list of actress who are so hot that it takes people a while to realize they suck. She's in league with Salma Hayek and Heather Graham. Note to Catherine: Take your clothes off and then go away. The other embarrassing performance belongs to Hank Azaria. Typically, I like Azaria, but his lisping Spaniard brings to mind Mickey Rooney in "Breakfast at Tiffany's".

If you are a die hard Roberts or Cusack fan you should check this movie out, even then it can certainly wait for video. Of course, if you are a die hard Roberts or Cusack fan, you've already seen it and thought, "Gee, I could've waited for video." The rest of you can wait for cable. Truth is, I laughed during this movie. I laughed a lot. I don't think I was laughing when Billy Crystal thought I was going to though.