The Holiday

"I'm a book writer in London.You're beautiful,a movie-trailer maker in LA.We're worlds apart.I have a cow in the backyard"

Lines like these and other sickly saccharine elements make Nancy Meyers The Holiday a pale romantic comedy that is not only filled to the brim with terminally cute, vomit-inducing moments and a bunch of characters that aren’t remotely charming but incessantly annoying, but it’s unfortunate enough to be disgraced by the presence of Cameron Diaz, who’s marginally entrancing looks and beautiful smile becomes a silly excuse and substitute for an almost total lack of talent. There’s a lot of glutinous fluff in this film, and it all simply lies in the way Nancy Myers insists to include every single one of the genre’s tiresome hallmarks-the adorable puppy (who looks utterly miserable to be there), the pitiful babbling old man, the motherless children etc. The way events unfold share an all too similar pattern and objective-how the ostensibly raging playboy turns out to be a sympathetic widow, how an alcohol-driven one-night stand develops into a ‘relationship’, how the two women find men who they’re inexplicably attracted to instantaneously arriving at their doorstep. The only possible redeeming factor is in Jack Black’s performance (Kate Winslet was certainly impressive, but I’ve seen her done much better countless times before with roles that were quirky/serious and had more flesh to them), most of the characters he chooses to play nowadays are intolerably self-indulgent, loud and insanely annoying-but here he chooses to tone it down and once again the old Jack Black, the one I fell in love with in High Fidelity makes a long-awaited appearance. I did laugh more than once while watching the Holiday (and the script does have its smart points, a big break from the usual brainless gibberish we find in most romantic comedies), and as a comedy it satisfies much more-whereas as a romance it disappoints, much of this malfunction attributed to its blind loyalty to the genre’s conventional approach and blatant predictability: there’s nothing new offered and its overly long running time (130 mins) feels dull for the most. Although it’s worth mentioning The Holiday shines in comparison to The Break-Up or Love,Actually, both of which I thought were cinematic disasters (so if you thought any of the two films above were good, there’s a chance you might just enjoy this). Aside from the targeted demographic, I suggest others watch the DVD so they can pause and linger a while before having to put up with the movie (The Holiday is best seen with low expectations or a distracted mood)-or if you’re looking for a good light romantic comedy to watch, a better alternative would be to rent older films