Friday, January 25, 2013

Review: The Hottie and the Nottie


Well, the easy way to do this review would be to spend the next 900 words or so trashing Paris Hilton for being a horrible actress and a worse person and so forth.
                But I’m not going to do that. For one, because I like to do things the hard way or as I like to call it, Colin’s way.
                Secondly, I don’t hate Paris Hilton all that much as an actress. I mean, she really does lack any sort of talent, but still I have to give the girl credit for starring in a personal favorite: “House of Wax.” I’d call it a guilty pleasure, but I feel no guilt about loving that movie. It’s a cheesy good time and it has Jared Padalecki in it. Recipe for success.
                So, let’s get that out of the way right at the top. Paris sucks. She’s not an actress and she spends more of the movie posing than she does playing a character.
                Done. The rest of the people involved in “The Hottie and the Nottie?” Uh-uh. Paris is a drunken party girl, but the rest of you people are supposed to be professionals, so what’s your excuse for this mess?
Acting is bad, but script is worse. Pedophile undertones are more like ovetones. Can't see the need to watch this one again.


                That’s the thing. Paris took a lot of flack for this movie, but even with a competent leading lady, it would still be a total cluster f from start to finish.
                The biggest culprit is the script from Heidi Ferrer.
                In the movie Paris plays Christabel, a super-hot girl that every guy in town wants to bang. She’s best friends with a gal named June (Christine Lakin), who is the polar opposite. June has all sorts of funky moles, deformed toenails and too much hair in places where you don’t want any and not enough in the places you do.
                Enter Joel David Moore as Nate, a tall, lanky, nerdy loser who was obsessed with Paris when they were kids together in the first grade. Only the first grade though, somehow they never saw each other after that. Maybe he switched schools or something, the movie never specifies.
                Anyway, he’s maintained that obsession well into adulthood, occasionally looking longingly at a picture he has of Christabel he’s kept all these years. From when she was a small child. In the first grade. Take a minute to let that sink in. It’s an adult man making lovey eyes at a picture of a little girl. Yeah, so aspiring screenwriters take note: Probably not a good idea to make your leading man look like a raging pedophile. Unless that’s what your movie is about, in which case, go sick.
                But Nate’s not supposed to be a pedophile. He just really, really seems like one. And even if you somehow manage to ignore that massive strike against, his character still isn’t very likeable. More on that later.
                Christabel has vowed not to sleep with any more dudes until she can find June a man of her own. Nate seizes the opportunity to set June up with any sort of random wackos he can find, even performing do-it-yourself electroshock therapy on one guy to convince him June’s actually hot.
                So this goes on for a while and spoiler alert. Eventually June undergoes a “She’s All That” style makeover and it turns out, under the extra body hair and moles and green teeth, she’s actually cute. Shocking!!!
                Nate ends up spending lots of time obviously flirting with June and even kisses her once she gets prettied up. Despite all that, he spends almost as much time with June talking about how he wants to bang Christabel.  So he also kind of comes across as a huge scum bag in addition to the earlier pedophile thing.
                Underneath all that mess, I guess there’s supposed to be some sort of positive message about inner beauty, even though June only gets anyone’s attention by completely overhauling her whole outer appearance. But yeah … themes are hard so whatev.
                Apologies to Joel David Moore, but he’s wildly miscast as Nate. In no reality or dimension of time or space would Paris Hilton ever be attracted to him and all of the trendy facial hair configurations in the world will never hide that fact.                
                 “Hottie and the Nottie” also has a character type that never fails to drive me nuts: the chubby, overtly creepy, sort of goofy but probably a date rapist best friend, in this case it’s portrayed by someone who actually calls himself The Greg Wilson. Seriously. I hate this type of character so much. I’m looking at you “Good Luck Chuck.”
                Honestly though, there’s no reason the plot of “Hottie and the Nottie” should ever happen. None of the characters have any reason to spend any time together. The Greg Wilson was Nate’s best friend also in the first grade and the first grade alone. Somehow though he’s more than willing to put his life on hold and help this essential stranger --- Nate --- bang another total stranger --- Christabel.
                Like I said. Paris took a lot of heat, and she is a miserable actress and an easy target, but as far as the problems with “Hottie and the Nottie” go, she’s somewhere more in the middle. 

                Worst of the Worst

                The scene where Nate and June share deserts while sitting romantically close on the floor together. He spends all this time flirting with June, leading her on and then even kisses her, but somehow still has the balls to ask her to help him bed Paris. If you didn’t despise Nate by that point in the movie --- keep in mind, he’s basically been painted as an accidental pedophile --- you definitely will after that.
                Bumblebee tuna.  

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