Something Borrowed

If you know me, one of my general movie going habits is to avoid Kate Hudson movies at all costs. She is grating, unfunny and not particularly attractive, in my opinion. However, when you put her in a movie with the adorable Ginnifer Goodwin and hilarious John Krasinski, I cannot be so harsh on my habit. I still probably would not have seen it if I had to pay for movies and did not have a girlfriend who wanted to see it. There is just something so annoying about everything Kate Hudson says and does. So, it is with my Anti Kate Hudson glasses on that I went into this movie.

Rachel(Goodwin) and Darcy(Hudson)are best friends and have been since childhood. Darcy is loud, flirtacioud and fashionable and Rachel is bookish, awkward and a pushover. Darcy is engaged to Dex(Colin Egglesfield), who was Rachel's good friend and crush from law school. The night of Rachel's 30th birthday, she and Dex have sex and after she admits she always had a crush on him. Dex becomes quickly confused as to what he wants. He thinks he loves Darcy, but he always wanted Rachel, so for a while he gets them both. he and Rachel start secretly dating, and Darcy remains oblivious. Rachel's other best friend Ethan(Krasinski) becomes her sounding board and he sometimes has to tell her what she does not want to hear.

It has been roughly a week since I watched Something Borrowed and I am still undecided what exactly I feel about it. The movie is undoubtedly funny. John Krasinski is just hilarious in every scene that features him and the script has some genuinely funny moments and situations. Goodwin and Hudson have pretty good chemistry and there is a wonderful moment involving them and a Salt N Pepa song that might be the highlight of the movie. Goodwin is her usual adorably self conscious self on screen and she really sells the drama of the story, especially in the big confession at the end. She is sexy in a subtle way and even though Hollywood keeps trying to sell her as more on the frumpy side, the girl is gorgeous.

However, there is something deeper going on in this movie that keeps me from really liking it. The premise of the movie is essentially a girl has sex with her best friend's fiance. Rachel's selfishness is constantly rewarded, Dex is an indecisive asshole and Darcy is an obnoxious brat who has nothing nice to say to anyone throughout the entire movie. These are the three people we are supposed to care about enough to watch them for nearly 2hrs, but I honestly did not like any of them. Hudson's Darcy is the kind of movie character that should have no friends and only in film does this kind of personality come across as charming to a group of people. Krasinski's character is the only one who can seem to call Darcy on her shit and he is the only one really worth caring about.

I do not need likable characters in my movies, but in what is supposed to be a kind of breezy ROMCOM, I should. I should care if the characters are happy and I honestly did not. In fact, I think the movie takes the easy way out in the climax. These characters do not deserve the Hollywood ending and in giving it to them, the movie cheats life. Granted, there are consequences and the consequences are long lasting, but in the end, we get the ending we all knew we were going to get at the end of the movie. The writer got lazy which is too bad because there are at least 3 inspired scenes where the writing really helped sell these characters. The scene involving the Salt N Pepa song has a really great feel to it and almost endears the Kate Hudson character to me. Then Ethan's confession is honest, sad and beautiful and of course, the big major confession from Goodwin is wonderful, but it is all spoiled by false moment after false moment.

When the lights came up, I felt incredibly mixed emotions for the film. I was super annoyed by the ending and by the actions or lack of actions by the characters, but I also laughed a lot during the movie, especially at two side plots involving Ethan's one night stand and this super douchey guy Darcy tries to set up Rachel with. So what I have decided is that I loved everything about the movie that was not directly related to the main story. I love Goodwin, but as likable as she is, her character is too much of a pushover and by the time she grows a backbone, it is too late, I was over it. Hudson actually looked hot a few times in this movie, which is a rare thing for me to say, but she did not help make Darcy any more likable. I would have rather seen a movie built around the supporting characters!

Final Grade: C+