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    		•

    FILMS

    America's Sweethearts (2001)
  • Starring Julia Roberts, Billy Crystal, John Cusack, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Hank Azaria, Stanley Tucci, Christopher Walken, Alan Arkin, Seth Green

  • Directed by Joe Roth

    • America's Sweethearts is an odd movie. Funny at times, but definitely odd. Odd, in that, it tries it's hardest to persecute Hollywood executives and the snobbery and eccentricities of the actors that come out of the studio system and yet the film itself comes right out of that same system. (I imagine that the writers and directors had to tread softly with this one.) In fact, you don't get much more Hollywood than Julia Roberts and Billy Crystal. Yet, to the film's credit, it does manage to get in a few nice, solid punches (or cat-claw scratches) at the actors and actresses that think they're God's gift to cinema. No names are mentioned, but we've all heard "stories about" so-and-so. Everyone, and I mean everyone, glances at the supermarket tabloids. I'm not saying everyone buys them, but everyone reads the headlines, baby. That's why they're there.

    John Cusack (I'm not going to bother with characters names, as it's not really important) pretty much plays himself, but magnified by ten. So, he's endearing and he stammers in the same way that made everyone fall in love with him in Say Anything. He plays a good actor who was deeply hurt when Catherine Zeta-Jones (together they make up the duo of "America's Sweethearts") broke up their marriage. They were the finest acting couple in Hollywood. Five of their last six films broke $100 million dollars. Now Cusack is in a rehab "wellness center" and Zeta-Jones... hrm, well, nothing important needs to be said about her other than, in this film, she plays a raving bitch. If her powers of bitchiness could be harnessed from this movie, California would never be in the dark again.

    Julia Roberts plays Zeta-Jones' sister who is also Zeta-Jones' cute but innocent personal assistant. She's pretty much Julia as in most of her films. In Pretty Woman she played a cute but innocent hooker. In Pelican Brief she played a cute but innocent law student. In Mary Reilly she played the cute yet innocent servant. In Erin Brockovich she played a cute but trashy mom-turned-savior. In I Love Trouble... the less said about that, the better. Roberts puts up with Zeta-Jones' garbage because she's her sister, and I guess it just goes to show how cute and innocent she is. Billy Crystal is a public relations expert who just got fired by Stanley Tucci from the studio. Seth Green is to take his place. Of course, Crystal is asked back to do one more publicity junket for the last Zeta-Jones/Cusack film that was in the can before they broke up a year ago. Christopher Walken is the director who refused to show anyone the film until the press junket. So, Billy Crystal has to organize a media circus to raise hype for a film that, at the moment, doesn't exist.

    Blah blah blah. This movie is pretty much straight and forward. It's predictable. (But I won't give any plot points away here, just in case you want to see it, and don't find it predictable.) Every epiphany that a character has is telegraphed to you 10 minutes before he/she has it. But that's OK, because this is not a deep, meaningful film that requires anything of you. It's a lark. A no-brainer. A piece of cinematic silliness that pokes fun of executives and actors. And who doesn't like that? It's always fun, regardless of the fact that it's shallow and useless. (Not every movie has to be an "experience," does it?)

    As with many television shows and films so it is with America's Sweethearts—the best characters are the secondary and tertiary characters—specifically Christopher Walken, Seth Green, Alan Arkin, and Hank Azaria. If it were up to me, I would've fired the four people with top billing and written a script about these four guys.

    Walken, as mention above, plays a director that—if he wasn't modeled after Stanley Kubrick, I'd be shocked. He's difficult and mysterious, but his character's movies are never just movies, they're art. Actors eat that shit up with a spoon—so everyone wants to work with him. Walken is a complete nutjob in this film and my only complaint is that they didn't use him more. Green has a few throwaway lines, and frankly his part could've been erased completely with no hazard to the plot, but there's a scene that has him jogging near a golf course. I don't know why, but when he gets hit in the head with a golfball, I nearly wet my pants. (I actually rewound it three times just to watch him get hit again and again.)

    Alan Arkin plays an Indian (real Indian, not Native American) Wellness Guide who says enigmatic pseudo-Eastern-cum-Los Angeles-philosophy crap like "A cookie only has so many chocolate chips in it," and other such nonsense, and lets Cusack figure things out for himself. But Arkin plays the straight-man so well, he gets me giggling. Hank Azaria plays a muscle-bound Italian who is now dating Zeta-Jones. (Damn, I hate hyphenated names. Good thing she didn't go for Douglas-Zeta-Jones.) Azaria's character has the same lisp as his Agador character in The Birdcage, except in this film he's straight. He's there to yell and throw things at Cusack which, in and of itself, is pretty darn funny.

    So that's short version of the rundown of the characters and plot. Whew! So, is this movie worth a rental? Sure. Three bucks, it's not bad. Leave your brain at the door, though. It's not bad and it's not offensive ('less you work in Hollywood, and you realize they're mocking you.) There's a few good scenes that are genuinely funny, and then there's a few scenes that you'll laugh at, but deep in your mind you'll know that they are taken from real-life moments in Hollywood cinema.

    Specifically, I'm referring to the scene where Tucci the Executive mentions that if Cusack commits suicide, the opening weekend box office draw would be outstanding. And he's only half-joking. That scene, along with any scene where Zeta-Jones is bitching and moaning and complaining about how difficult her life is... holy crap—I wanted to throw my Coke through the TV at her!

    Sadly, television doesn't work that way.