Let’s just say I was relieved to get out of the movie theater after watching the clunky compilation of parodies on romantic comedies, Date Movie. Despite the film’s plot defects, I did thoroughly enjoy some of the spoofs. Date Movie, written and directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, advertised as “two of the six writers of Scary Movie,” stars Alyson Hannigan as Julia Jones, an overweight and desperately unattractive woman with hopes of discovering Mr. Right. Jones thinks she has found him in Adam Campbell’s character, Grant Funckyerdoder (yes, funck-yer-doder, to set up the Meet the Fockers spoof later), the good-looking sweet guy who sees Jones for what she is on the inside. Throughout the movie, these two maneuver their way through common ‘date movie’ situations, a-la- Hitch, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Meet the Parents, and Meet the Fockers, which are used as main inspirations of spoofing. Certainly, as is the case for all spoofs, no one will look back on this movie and remember it for its plot. That being said, I still feel the cast as a whole did a decent enough job getting the humor of the story across. Alyson Hannigan is competent as the Cinderella-esque Julia. Her greatest strength is in her physical delivery – she does a great job of timing the humorous instances. Many of the scenes failed to add anything new to the already funny moments, and instead only provided audiences with a game of tallying recognizable moments. There were a few spoofing gems scattered throughout the movie. One such moment that had the whole theatre roaring was a hilariously long parody on the potty-trained cat from Meet the Parents, Jinxie, using the toilet. But such great moments were few and far between, as they barely kept the movie on its feet. Date Movie often feels more like a compiling of flashbacks instead of an entire movie entity on its own. The transitions between these different movie situations are abrupt and awkward, and in most instances they derail the plot almost entirely. People will find humor in Date Movie. There is no question about that. The question is not whether or not audiences will laugh, but instead how the clunky transitions and crude imitations will fare. I feel the eighty-minute long feature, quite short for motion picture standards, was long enough for even my attention span. Final Grade: 3-
