2012 Review #7: This Means War

This Means War

Rated PG-13
1 Hour 38 Minutes

Starring
Reese Witherspoon
Chris Pine
Tom Hardy
Chelsea Handler

My Grade

D

This Means War is the first shit fest film of 2012...at least for me. Granted, I've only seen seven movies so far this year so there's hardly a large enough sample size. But of the seven, this is by far the worst. Was I expecting it to be good? No. I do like to see movies though, that I know I probably won't like. One, because it could turn out to be good and two, I can't only go see movies I think look good or else this blog won't be credible, right? You have to sift through the piles of shit to truly appreciate the nuggets of gold. What a weird thing to say, oh well.

This Means War is a romantic buddy spy comedy. That's a lot of genres put in one film, but most of them didn't matter. Because this movie was hardly funny, but I will admit I chuckled a few times. Oddly enough, at the usually (to me) unfunny Chelsea Handler. The spy stuff featured in this film will hardly make you quiver from excitement and all the buddy stuff is so awful. It doesn't have an original story, but that's obvious from the trailer. It's about two best friends who are also partners in the CIA who end up falling for the same girl. The girl knows she is dating two men at once, which in itself is pretty terrible, but she is unaware the two men know each other. The two CIA friends do know however, and begin a spy vs. spy, who has the biggest balls competition to win her over. They utilize their CIA resources to spy on each others dates and sometimes sabotage. This must be one bored CIA office if so many people can be pulled for this "special" project. There is an actual CIA operation that goes on in bits and pieces of the background of this film's story, but it's only a plot device to have this love triangle come to a climatic and explosive end.

The characters in This Means War are so damn unlikable that I just didn't care how it turned out in the end, even though, you can predict how it will end a mile away. You can just tell who each guy ends up with. But these two friends are such selfish, vile people that none of them deserve to get the girl. They are both assholes, and I guess girls love that...what I know, I'm gay. Sure these guys are "pretty" to look at, but their characters are painted so ugly that I can't see how Reese Witherspoon would even fall for them as quickly as she did. Oh wait, yes I could...because she's a terrible character as well. She takes advice from her clearly mentally unstable friend played by Chelsea Handler so you already know she's not a great judge of character. But then again....we wouldn't have a film if these characters weren't all a little crazy.

It's just, I didn't find this movie remotely enjoyable. It's hard to find pleasure in a film when you don't like any of the characters...the main focal point of the movie. The action scenes were very scarce and were all a big let down because they were all so short lived. All the funny stunts they pulled on each other weren't funny or cool. Also, this film had some really noticably bad editing. It randomly fades to black then zooms back in to a new scene. It was very strange. The plot was very weak, and even the three normally talented actors couldn't save it.

So this movie wasn't for me. Doesn't mean others won't enjoy it. I think it's geared more towards the female community, which was most of the crowd in my theater. I may be gay, but I don't normally dig rom-com's. I'll try them out, but I feel they are all the same in the end. This Means War was no exception.