Hilary Swank
stars as Holly – a 29-year old lady with big dreams, but a
small apartment and
low paying job in New York City
(which is the movie’s first problem.
Her
apartment is ENORMOUS, especially by New York
standards, but I digress). However,
she has the perfect husband in
Irish, fun loving, rogue Gerry (Gerard Butler).
They are madly in love, but he suddenly develops a
brain tumor, and
passes away.
As you can
imagine, Holly is devastated and living life in a haze of old movies
and stale
pizza boxes, but Gerry has a plan to help her get past it all. After his death, the
husband has arranged for
a series of letters to be delivered to his wife, each one with a new
challenge
to help Holly move on with her life.
Can Holly
accomplish her goals and start living again?
Hilary Swank is
not your typical girlie girl, but she desperately wants to be. I can understand her
desire because we all
have some idealized version of ourselves we wish the rest of the world
would
embrace (I want the world to look at me and see Johnny Depp). Due to this, you might
think P.S. I
Love You
will be an insufferable gooey mess of a chick flick trying to make you
laugh,
but it’s actually funny with a few gooey moments.
Swank will not
make anyone think she is the next coming of Lucille Ball, or even Julia
Louis-Dreyfus, but, aside from some painfully awkward physical
slapstick
comedy, she’s entertaining enough as co-writer/director
Richard LaGravenese and
co-writer Steven Rogers make P.S. I
Love You goofier than you
might expect. Swank
excels when we get to focus on her
character’s loneliness and mourning, but also as she makes
Holly come out of
her shell, embrace life again and stumble through a series of
adventures
designed to win us over.
Plus, Swank,
even when attempting to fill a role that is not her forte, looks a
million
times better next to Nellie McKay – the songstress who tries
acting in the role
of Holly’s sister. It’s
hard to tell if
McKay simply is overly enthusiastic and trying too hard, or working
while in a
chemically altered state that makes her rambunctious and loud. The rest
of the
cast is a collection of pros who know how to get the most out of the
script,
especially Lisa Kudrow, who is the most accomplished and brilliant
comedy actor
in the whole movie. She
makes the most
out of a bit part, which shows her brilliance, but makes you wish she was in the lead.
P.S. I
Love You
is a nice alternative to the heavy Oscar fare and action movies
dominating the
Cineplex at this time of year.
2
½
Waffles (Out of 4)
P.S. I
Love You is
rated PG-13 for sexual
references and brief nudity.
Copyright
2007 - WaffleMovies.com
