After contributing gags to the Scary Movie franchise, Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer send up Hollywood romantic comedies in Date Movie. It basically amounts to a lot of "desperate groping for laughs," fronted by Alyson Hannigan and British newcomer Adam Campbell. Despite warning from the critics, some desperate moviegoers did shell out for this and were no doubt left feeling cheap and used.
Dating Pains
At first glance it looks as if this DVD includes a generous batch of extras. In fact, like Hannigan's costume, it's mostly just padding. A prime example is an offering of two 'romantic screensavers' eg footage of a burning log fire and/or beach at twilight. Meanwhile the 12 'unseen' scenes are just flabbier versions of footage that already exists in the film. There's a more drawn out, and less funny take of Julia (Hannigan) and Grant (Campbell) kicking drunks on their first night out, the two dancing fat guys from the opening credit sequence performing their full boogie and Andy (Sophie Monk) really, really enjoying eating a banana...
The gag reel is just as short on laughs, unless you count Hannigan corpsing. Mostly though, it's just Eddie Griffin swearing when he forgets a line. Slightly funnier is a reel of soundbites with the cast reflecting on their worst dates. Campbell wins the prize for getting mugged in front of a girl. "I lost all manliness and honour," he says, which might explain why he signed up for this film...
GSOH Not Essential
Campbell gets a couple more laughs in the Making A Spoof section - but just a couple. He does a decent Peter Jackson impression in what is actually a series of mock video diaries following the making of King Kong. He showcases hi-tech effects like tickling Carmen Electra (as Ann Darrow) with a giant cotton bud and muses on a childhood spent playing with Barbie dolls. The joke gets a little old though after about two of the 12 entries. Plus, it has nothing to do with Date Movie. Elsewhere Campbell overcooks his impression of Meg Ryan from When Harry Met Sally in snippets from the audition tapes.
Friedberg and Seltzer try desperately to convince us that the film is hilarious by presenting it with an optional laughter track. However, in their commentary they praise Campbell by saying, "I hope he goes on to much better things than this." They quickly try to make amends adding that test audiences rated the film highly - even if they were entirely made up of teenagers. Like them, Hannigan, Campbell and Monk show signs of ADD in an alternative track where the best they can do is recall where they were on a particular day of shooting.
An alternative commentary by critics Scott Foundas and Bob Strauss is perhaps the best thing on this DVD, even though Strauss reckons he enjoyed the film. Conversely, Foundas claims to "envy" one of the actors in Hannigan's big dance scene at the very moment he drives a large nail through his head... Later he explains that the film isn't funny for the very reason that the actors are seen to be trying to be funny. Not surprisingly that's at odds with the directors' assertion that they had their actors "play it straight."
Rounding off the package is a trivia game that rewards you with elaborate cherry stem sculptures created inside Sophie Monk's mouth. She'd make a great poster girl for a new five-a-day fruit campaign, otherwise this DVD is just tasteless pulp.
EXTRA FEATURES
Date Movie is released on DVD on Monday 17th July.
