Enough Said

I'm pretty hard on romantic comedies.  I find most of them to be insincere at best and sexist at worst.  Force me to watch the new Katherine Heigl movie and I will rail against that movie and other like it.  This behavior may lead people to believe that I, like so many men, just have a problem with romances.  Not true.  Let it be known that I am a big softy.  Romance movies, whether comedic or serious, are some of my favorite movies.  I love to watch characters fall in love.  Brief Encounter (the greatest British film ever made and one of my top five favorite movies) stills gets me choked up and I must've seen it 15 times.  All I ask of a romance (and especially rom-coms) is for sincerity.  These are movies and realism need not be a factor, but I do need the filmmakers to earn the romance.

So does this new romantic comedy, Enough Said, have what it takes to please a picky, opinionated romantic?  I'm happy to say that it surely does. 

Enough Said is the story of a divorced massage therapist, Eva, who is grappling with inadequacy and impending loneliness in the face of her only child leaving for college.  She meets a woman, Marianne, whose life she covets and they strike up a friendship.  Mostly Eva and Marianne complain about their ex-husbands.  Eva takes a chance on dating Albert, a divorced man whose only child is also preparing to go off to college and a romance develops.  Through her conversations with Marianne, Eva realizes that she is dating Marianne's ex and the constant complaints from Marianne begin to sow the seeds of doubt in her relationship.

This movie was written and directed by Nicole Holofcener.  Not much can be said of her direction.  She's smart enough to keep a strong stylistic stamp out of the film.  This is a movie about characters and their interactions.  The last thing the film needs are a bunch of flashy shots or overt quirkiness.  Holofcener never presses her hand as a director and therefore never distracts the viewer from what is important: the snappy script and the brilliant performances.

The script is fantastic.  Not a single line is wasted.  Every word builds characters and every action drives the story forward.  On top of that, it's really funny.

James Gandolfini and Julia Louis-Dreyfus are phenomenal in Enough Said.  They are natural and hilarious and flirty.  Chemistry is an undefinable thing that can make or break a romantic movie.  These two have it in spades.  They are adorable together.  Gandolfini is magnificent.  He goes against type to play a teddy bear of a man.  He's sweet and gentle and fragile.  Louis-Dreyfus is basically playing an older version of Elaine Benes.  And that's just fine by me as Seinfeld is one of the greatest TV shows ever made.

In recent decades, movies about romance have become so cynical and manipulative that I'm lucky if I see one or two good ones a year.  This is one of those good ones.  Heck, it's a great one.  It's perfect for a date night or even a night alone with a tub of ice cream (give it a shot fellas). 

8 out of 10