Friday, March 7, 2008

No Reservations - DVD review

NO RESERVATIONS (**1/2) - Starring Catherine Zeta-Jones, Aaron Eckhart, Abigail Breslin, Bob Balaban, Patricia Clarkson, Brian F. O'Byrne, Jenny Wade and Celia Weston.
Directed by Scott Hicks.

I never saw Mostly Martha, the foreign film of which this is a remake, and I prefer seeing foreign-film remakes that way. Rarely is the glossed-over US version better, and I'd rather not be comparing the whole time. I saw Point of No Return before I saw La Femme Nikita, and if you're going to see both, that's the way to do it.

This is a fluffy, harmless romance. Not really a comedy, since nothing funny happens, but it has a light-hearted air where you think something funny might happen. I can't say Zeta-Jones and Eckhart have much chemistry, but I like seeing Eckhart play a nice guy every once in a while. The part that worked most for me was the drama in the relationship between this control-freak aunt and her suddenly orphaned niece (Breslin). The scene where the niece learned her mother was dead, I teared up, and I don't often do that, especially in a movie like this.

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