America's Sweethearts (2001)

Simply A Masterpiece

Expected more

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

Eddie (John Cusack) and Gwen (Catherine Zeta-Jones) are the movie couple everyone loves to see together. Their movies are the stuff of romantic legend, but Eddie is in a mental institution after nearly killing Gwen because she was cheating on him. Now the last movie they made together is being held hostage by the eccentric director (Christopher Walken). The head of the movie studio (Stanly Tucci) is so desperate for a hit that he re-hires the man he just fired (Billy Crystal) to gin up media hype for a movie nobody has seen, not even the studio.The movie is absolutely fantastic. The humor is very clever, not contrived or forced like in so many other films. The characters are well acted and entirely believable. The supporting cast is dynamite, Seth Green, Hank Azaria, and Alan Arkin all have memorable and entertaining parts. My personal favorite is Christopher Walken, his crazy director character is wildly entertaining, despite only having a few minutes of screen time. America's Sweetheart's is easily one of the best romantic comedies I have ever seen.

OK, it's an 8, but I voted 10 to raise the average a little bit.The script is funny, and the one-liners are vintage Crystal. The actors are uniformly fine, with Catherine Zeta Jones and Hank Azaria having the most fun, Alan Arkin showing the most restraint and John Cusack doing well with the toughest assignment. He is a national treasure. Joe Roth, the director, gets good performances out of the cast, and keeps things moving.If you have to put up with BS from impossible people on a regular basis, you'll laugh twice as hard. Go ahead and laugh.

I really liked America's sweethearts, which is a realistic sort of film. Some bits of it are unbelievable but I liked it. Would these people really need to act like they are together? They are not, get over it. Like with Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt, it's over... get over it. Likw with Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston, I had a favorite of the two. I much, much, much prefer Jennifer Aniston over Brad Pitt. But with Eddie(John Cusack) and Gwen(Cathrine Zeta Jones), I prefer Eddie. In America's sweethearts, Billy Crystal(The great Billy Crystal, sorry)plays Lee, a film agent who has recently been fired. He can get his job back if he does one thing. If he can get Eddie Thomas and Gwen Harrison(Played by John Cusack and Cathrine Zeta- Jones), a Hollywood couple, back together. Julia Roberts stars as Gwen's sister Kiki, and she is Gwen's agent. Soon Eddie and Kiki start to fall in love.I thought that America's sweethearts was good for what it was. I'll admit it's not a great film but it is pretty funny. This film has such a great cast. Stanley Tucci is in it, Seth Green is in it, even Christopher Walken is in it. He is hilarious. There is more to the plot than what I said though. I love John Cusack, I love Julia Roberts, I love Billy Crystal, I like Cathrine Zeta-Jones also. With a funny script, great cast and interesting story plot, America's sweethearts works.America's sweethearts:***/****

To be honest, I felt "America's Sweethearts" could have been a complete disaster. The acting is not real good overall, some of the characters (particularly Catherine Zeta-Jones') can be real annoying at times, and the plot was as predictable as they come. I could call just about every scene before it happened, and I was usually right. Nevertheless, the humor in the film (especially from Billy Crystal) saved the film from utter destruction. Even in a lesser film such as this one, Crystal can still make me laugh. For example, take one of my favorite quotes from this film ("Rule #1: Always take credit for what you've done" "Rule #2, before you take credit, make sure the person actually likes what you did.") That's about as funny as the film gets, which is really not too bad. The wisecracks here and there and Hollywood-related jokes make up for some of the poorly-done romance scenes in the film. We honest are not really able to care enough about the characters to make this a good romantic comedy. The ending doesn't leave the audience with a sense of joy like films such as "You've Got Mail" and "The Parent Trap" do. However, since I laughed a few times, I'll admit it wasn't too bad. As far as a Julia Roberts film goes, it's inferior to "My Best Friend's Wedding" but slightly better than "Runaway Bride." Not highly recommended, but it might make a good date film if you don't take it too seriously and set your expectations way low.**1/2 out of ****