Whitman news since 1896

Whitman Wire

Vol. CLIV, Issue 6
Whitman news since 1896

Whitman Wire

Whitman news since 1896

Whitman Wire

‘Definitely, Maybe’ an unexpected pleasure

With a tagline like “Three relationships. Three disasters. One last chance,” one might expect the fourth disaster that the wordsmith who composed that line forgot to mention will be the film itself. But as much as you can’t judge a book by its cover, you also shouldn’t judge a movie by its tagline. After all, practically the same tagline could apply to “Casablanca.”

That isn’t to say that “Definitely, Maybe” is a comparable film to “Casablanca”; these films don’t even exist on the same plane as one another, and to say such a thing would be heresy. The point is, “Definitely, Maybe” is not as bad as you might expect. It is written and directed by Adam Brooks, who also penned the screenplay for the charming film “French Kiss” back in 1995, and while it has certainly been churned out of the same romantic comedy machine as many other films of the same genre, Brooks’ machine at least has a different make and model.

Rather than the typical boy meets girl scenario, Brooks gives us a retrospective look at three failed relationships of one man. Will Hayes (Ryan Reynolds) is in the midst of a divorce when his 10-year-old daughter Maya (Abigail Breslin) asks him about how he met her mother in hopes that he will remember why he fell in love with her in the first place and decide to stay with her. Reluctant at first, Will decides to play along, but according to his own rules: he’ll tell her the story, but include two other girlfriends and change all the names so Maya will have to guess who her mother is.

It becomes a sort of mystery romance, where Maya and the audience play detective as Will relates the details of his relationships with these women. The suspects include Emily (Elizabeth Banks), Will’s college sweetheart; April (Isla Fisher), a free-spirited copygirl Will meets at his first job out of college and Summer (Rachel Weisz), an intelligent, aspiring journalist. His relationships with these women overlap and weave together, keeping you guessing at the identity of the woman he finally ended up marrying.

The most delightfully surprising aspect of this film is that it is genuinely funny. Brooks reaches for small, realistic moments of humor rather than over-the-top gags to get a laugh, which is highly effective. A lot of the comedy stems from the scenario of an adult telling stories of courtship to a child: Will frequently forgets to omit details about his former self such as smoking cigarettes or drinking his friends under the table, and Maya’s shocked reactions to her father’s “tawdry” past are amusing.

Reynolds and Breslin make a fantastic father-daughter team, and Reynolds is unexpectedly believable as a father, considering his previous acting gigs in films like “Van Wilder” and “Just Friends.” Breslin, who appears to be replacing Dakota Fanning as America’s Next Top Child Actor, does a lovely job with this role and often seems wise beyond her years.

Will’s love interests (Banks, Fisher, and Weisz) give strong, believable performances as well. Impressively, Reynolds manages to have chemistry with each of them, though they all portray very different, distinctive women. Realistically, any one of them could be Maya’s mother, so the mystery portion of the story works well for most of the film.

What is not realistic about the film, however, is that Brooks expects his audience to believe that a child as intelligent as Maya would not piece together bits of her mother’s past and figure out her identity from these. Would a 10-year-old really not know where her mother went to college, or her chosen profession?

Furthermore, Brooks includes an abysmal amount of references to the ’90s, which are funny at times (Will works on a campaign for some guy named Bill Clinton, everybody walks around with enormous cell phones), but they can also grate a bit on the soul.

Still, the film is entertaining, with real humor and charming, likeable characters. There’s even a bit of a twist at the end, just in case you were sure you knew who Maya’s mother was going to be. It’s always so convenient for romantic comedies to end right when two people realize they are in love and before anything can go wrong, but at least Brooks admits that there are countless things that can go awry in a relationship even when you are in love with someone. Plus, despite being a little corny, it’s always nice to think that everybody definitely gets a second chance. Maybe.

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