1699 - Love & Other Drugs

After a revisit this is still one of my favorite films from last year.  For those who don't know it's about a pharmaceutical drug rep who falls for a girl with Parkinson's.  But that's under-selling it.  What it really is is a film about who people that are empty and in denial about what they really want and need from life.  The Parkinson's absolutely adds another layer to the film and makes it far more relevant, but deep down it's still an great love story about two damaged people.  Anne Hathaway is fantastic here.  She's funny, and sweet, and spunky.  But she's also so heartbreaking.  This role could have been such a show-offy type role for an actor but she takes it and infuses it with grace and honesty.  She's gorgeous and shows off her body in this film in some sexy ways, but what's most impressive is how ugly she allows herself to be here as well both inside and out.  This might be my favorite role of hers to date and it'll be hard to beat it.
If you haven't seen this film it's on netflix now.  It's funny, it's sweet, and it's above all things, honest.  I recommend it quite highly.

1511 - Love and Other Drugs

 

I wanted to see this film for several reasons.  Mostly because this is the kind of film that I just suck up.  I'm a big fan of films about relationships, and ultimately people who struggle with them.  Sure I love a good blow-up as much as anyone, and I love films of all genres in general, but nothing gets me more excited than a film about people struggling with love.  I realize how un-guyly that makes me.  I could care less.  Another of the reasons has a lot to do with the cast.  Jake is great, always liked him - but Anne Hathaway is someone who I think is a megastar in terms of her ability to get into the skin of a character and just 'be'.  She is phenomenal.  It would be so easy to go over-the-top with a role like this, but she finds these amazing moments of restraint while at the same time having a lot of fun with it when it's appropriate.

So, what's the film about you might be asking...  Without giving away too much it's essentially a love story about two people looking for anything but a love story.  Jake is a pharmaceutical rep and Anne is a woman who has a very serious illness - the kind that is not going to get better as time goes on.  And so it takes a hard look and asks difficult questions.  Would you want to spend the rest of your life with someone that you have to take care of?  Or can you accept the fact that you're going to have to be taken care of by someone else?  It's the kind of questions that make the problems in most love stories look extremely trivial by comparison.  This film doesn't attack, but raises a lot of questions about medication in our society and how the system works.  It doesn't cast judgment so much as it presents a point of view.

Needless to say, I really liked this film and I'll be revisiting it at some point.  Emily felt it to be a bit too long, but I didn't notice.  Ebert's review said that it had script/tone issues in that it felt like a screwball comedy that got a bit too serious and lost it's way.  Again, I never had a problem with it.  It made me laugh, it made me care, and it even got me a little emotional at the end.  I blame you, Anne Hathaway, you magnificent bastard, you.

Love and Other Drugs   Love and Other Drugs [Blu-ray]