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MOVIE CRITIQUE:
Okay, Okay, I am a hopeless romantic, so you have to take that into consideration when it comes to my reviews about a
movie like this. Movies of this type are now referred to by cynics as "Meet Cute movies" because of the fact that
the the two stars involved are so doggone cute.
You all have seen the plot device a thousand times before: Boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love, something happens
to break them up, and, finally, true love succeeds in the end. Because it is a story line that we can all identify with, this
type of movie will be of interest only if the story is heartfelt and honest and the two actors involved have that special
chemistry that make us root for them to succeed.
"Bounce" does succeed on this level. Ben Affleck, the male lead from the earlier "Good Will Hunting",
is now teamed up with his former girlfriend, Gwyneth Paltrow ("Shakespeare in Love" and "Sliding Doors"),
in this sweet but rather drawn-out romance. Their romance has a few problems and some strange plot resolutions near the end,
but it eventually works out and we leave the theater feeling that we have enjoyed ourselves in watching this movie.
The formulaic plot line of this movie is elevated by the intelligent writing and the charm of the two characters, who
each give this movie so much chemistry and energy that you can't help but be drawn in.
Jennifer Grey from "Dirty Dancing" and the canceled sitcom last year has a bit part in "Bounce" as
does Tony Goldwyn, the slime ball from "Ghost", who plays Abby's loving husband and the one who starts the movie
off by unexpectedly dying in an airplane crash. Unfortunately, his role was so indelibly creepy in the former movie ("Ghost"),
that it is somewhat difficult to view him as the loving husband of Paltrow's Abby Janello in this movie.
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MOVIE SYNOPSIS:
Buddy Amaral (Ben Affleck) is first introduced to us as a self-centered narcissistic head of a boutique ad agency who
has just won the advertising account of Infinity Airlines, the airline that he is now waiting at O'Hare Airport for the flight
that will take him back to his home in Los Angeles. It is late in December and a major winter snowstorm is starting to blow
in from Canada.
Passing the time before the departure of his flight at an airport bar, Buddy happens to meet a major babe, blonde Mimi
Prager (Natasha Henstridge), who sends him signals that she is hot for his body. By coincidence, he also happens to run into
a young married man, Greg Janello (Tony Goldwyn), who is desperate to get back home to his wife and family in Los Angeles
by Christmas Eve.
Lust beckons the otherwise unoccupied Amaral, so his motives in donating his boarding pass to Greg Janello are somewhat
less than generous. However, his donation does allow Janello to get out of Chicago's O'Hare before the incoming storm shuts
down the airport. This serendipitous occurrence leaves Buddy and Mimi the free time and the desired opportunity to head for
the nearest hotel room.
To his horror, Buddy later finds out that the Infinity Airlines plane that he was supposed to have been on has crashed
in the Rockies. This causes an abrupt change in his heretofore unexamined, supposedly near perfect life as the eternal question
"There but for the grace of God go I" eats away at his soul.
He subsequently descends into a self-destructive bout of alcoholism, and later, as an A. A. member who has sworn off alcohol,
he discovers that one of the 12 steps to recovery is to make amends with those whom he has harmed. To Buddy, this implies
checking up on the status of the widow of Greg Janello, the deceased husband to whom he had given his airplane ticket.
Up until this point in the movie Buddy Amaral has been pretty much portrayed as a selfish, obnoxious jerk, so much so
that he has squandered a great deal of the sympathy that would naturally have been his due. I felt that this part of his
character could have been written as being less obnoxious, but others might argue that this makes his redemption for the love
of a woman after being a member of A. A. all the more sweet and victorious. You can see the movie and decide for yourself.
Gwyneth Paltrow, in her dressed-down role as the widow, Abby, is just as sweet as ever in her trademarked role of a little-girl-lost
along with being all sweetness and vulnerable. Now she is a spunky young widow who is desperately tying to make a go of it
after her earlier dreams have been trashed by the unexpected death of her husband.
Now reduced to selling shopping space in cheap strip malls as a
low rent realtor in order to make ends meet, she is presented as an even more sympathetic character. Buddy, in a grand
gesture of generosity, gets her the commission from the lease to the multimillion dollar office building that his ad agency
wants to rent.
She makes the assumption, originally incorrect, that he is interested in her for more than her professional capabilities
as a realtor, so she invites him to a Dodgers game. Their relationship eventually blossoms and Buddy even ends up bonding
with her two young sons.
You can guess the plot of the rest of the movie in which Buddy knows something important and relevant that Abby doesn't.
He is enjoying their romance so much that the fact that he was somewhat responsible for the death of her former husband is
a topic that he is more than reluctant to bring up.
Will she find out before he tells her or will he have the guts to risk their now-blossoming relationship by revealing
the truth that he is not quite who she thinks he is and that he has actually wormed his way into their relationship under
somewhat duplicitous circumstances?
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