The Break-Up
(Theatrical Film Review)
Stars: Vince Vaughn, Jennifer Aniston, Jon Favreau, Joey Lauren
Adams
Director: Peyton Reed
Critic's rating: 7 out of 10
Review by Chuck O'Leary
Back at the tail end of Burt Reynolds' five-year run as the No. 1
box-office attraction in America, he teamed with Goldie Hawn for a
most-underappreciated effort, the wonderful anti-romantic comedy Best
Friends (1982). With Reynolds and Hawn still at the height of
their stardom, Best Friends should have been a
huge hit during the 1982 holiday season. Instead, it
did just moderately well, in part, I think, because critics and audiences
were a bit taken aback by the film's often-sour tone.
Going in the opposite direction of most screen romances, Reynolds
and Hawn starred as screenwriting partners and longtime lovers whose
relationship quickly begins to deteriorate once they marry. Best
Friends offered plenty of big laughs, but those laughs often came from
situations that were probably a little too uncomfortably real even for
audience in 1982; the Norman Jewison-directed film lacked the
over-the-top mean-spiritedness of The War of the Roses, which
clearly took place in a less-threatening world of movie fantasy. Best
Friends, though, lacked that degree of comic exaggeration and
probably hit a little too close to home for some viewers.
The Break-Up starring Vince Vaughn and Jennifer
Aniston isn't as good as Best Friends or The
War of the Roses, but it still retains enough of
an edge and contains enough realistic human behavior to make
it better than most contemporary mainstream comedies.
Therefore, it's going to be interesting to see how well The Break-Up
does once word gets out that it's not a typical, formulaic,
feel-good romantic-comedy. Since it obviously mirrors Aniston's
much-publicized real-life divorce from Brad Pitt, and
Aniston has reportedly become an off-screen item with co-star Vaughn, The
Break-Up should at least open well. But my guess is that a lot
of people aren't going to like it for all the wrong reasons.
Based on something that happens all the time in real life, The
Break-Up is about two people who end up in a relationship, but who
never should have gotten together in the first place. Whatever attraction
that exists between the two isn't enough to overcome the realization after
moving in together that they're completely different people with precious
little in common. Yuppie Brooke (Aniston) and blue-collar Gary
(Vaughn) are two opposites who attract, but begin to grate on each other's
nerves once they begin to share a condo.
Brooke, an art-gallery employee, might find the nerve of
extroverted Gary, a Chicago tour guide in business with his two
brothers, amusing when they meet cute at a Cubs game, but once they move
in together she's annoyed by the fact that he's just an average guy who
likes hanging out with his buddies, watching sports and playing video
games. Gary, on the other hand, might initially be enamored of Brooke's
down-to-earth, sexy girl-next-door quality, but becomes annoyed when she
demonstrates a more sophisticated side that prefers ballet to sporting events
and neatness to clutter.
In what quickly turns into the male-female equivalent of
Felix Unger and Oscar Madison, Brooke and Gary begin to feud, and soon call it
quits. But since they're all paid up and have time remaining on their
condo lease, neither one of them is willing to move out. This leads to a War
of the Roses-style battle where Brooke and Gary divide the
apartment into their own separate sections, and then attempt to annoy the other
into leaving. Much bickering ensues.
At a packed invitational screening, a man sitting next to me
annoyingly sounded like a human laugh track during early scenes, but his
laughter quickly subsided once Gary and Brooke become
embittered. It makes me wonder if The Break-Up will end
up being too dark for Vaughn and Aniston fans the way The Cable Guy
proved too dark for Jim Carrey's audience? Personally, I appreciate when
movies aren't afraid to accentuate the negative sides of life, but you get the
feeling audiences have become so accustomed to airhead cinema devoid
of all realism that they don't know how to react when any sense of reality
seeps in.
The Break-Up also benefits from a very entertaining
supporting cast which includes Vaughn's real-life buddy and Swingers
and Made co-star Jon Favreau as Gary's bartender confidant;
Joey Lauren Adams as Brooke's married sister; Vincent D'Onofrio as Gary's
responsible older brother; Cole Hauser as Gary's hedonistic younger
brother; John Michael Higgins as Brooke's possibly gay brother whose a cappella
singing is a great source of irritation for Gary; Jason Bateman as Brooke
and Gary's realtor friend; Judy Davis as Brooke's tough cookie of a boss;
and yes, that's Peter Billingsley of A Christmas Story
fame as Adams' henpecked husband -- he's also a co-executive
producer. The film does a good job of juggling these secondary
characters and gives most of them a nice moment or two, but I only wish
Ann-Margret had been given more screen time as Brooke's mother.
Coincidentally, for a film that plays a bit like Best
Friends for a younger generation, the characters in The
Break-Up are seen playing Win, Lose or Draw
in one scene, a game invented by none other than Burt Reynolds.
