Now, I think John Cusack is damn near perfect, but he's miscast as Eddie Thomas, the movie star who has a nervous breakdown after his wife and frequent co-star, Gwen Harrison (Catherine Zeta-Jones) leaves him for a Spaniard (Hank Azaria). He just doesn't look like a Movie Star, not the way, say, Ben Affleck or the young Alec Baldwin does, all gleaming white teeth and chiseled cheekbones. Cusack's appeal has always been as an Everyman, which is exactly what he shouldn't be here.
In fact, Zeta-Jones as the breathtakingly self-centered diva is the only person who seems well cast. Julia Roberts, as her "plain" sister and personal assistant, certainly doesn't look the part of the frumpy, overshadowed mouse she's meant to be, even with a fat suit on (Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly put my queasy feelings about the fat suit into perfect words: "It must be said, and said again with each pretty, slender actress who selflessly plays pretend-fat: The added weight isn't shocking or even unattractive; it's the assumption of inevitable frumpiness and sexual starvation that's ugly"). And the normally funny Azaria is just demeaning and grating with his exaggerated, lisping accent.
The supporting cast offers a little more relief. Stanley Tucci is entertaining as the over-caffeinated studio head, and Billy Crystal, who also wrote the script, has a few good lines as the press agent, Lee, whose job it is to get Gwen and Eddie back together -- at least for the press junket. Christopher Walken doesn't go nearly far enough in his portrayal of the wacko director of Eddie and Gwen's latest film (he buys the Unabomber's cabin and has it moved to his estate to use as his office), but he's fun nevertheless.
But the pleasures in this film are few and far between. It unfortunately relies too much on lowest-common-denominator humor, like a crotch-licking dog or a guy getting whacked in the crotch by a cactus, which undermines what ought to be witty and sophisticated. Cusack and Roberts work nicely together, but in general there's little or no chemistry among the actors; everything just falls flat. You're expecting champagne, and instead you get apple juice.
And now, indulge me in an audience rant. Fifteen minutes into the movie, a couple came all the way up to the top row of the theater, where we were sitting, and came all the way into the center of the aisle to sit next to me. Immediately, the woman took out her cell phone and put it on her lap. Every time the green screen went dark, she hit a button so it beeped and lit up again. Meanwhile, she chattered away with her boyfriend, oblivious to the evil glares she was getting from me and the people in front of her. Halfway through the movie, she made a call on her cell phone, passing the phone back and forth with her boyfriend. I was shaking with rage by the time the movie ended. I mean, what possesses these fucking idiots to spend money to sit in the dark and talk to their friends and distract everyone around them who has paid money to actually watch a film? And how do I stop them?
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