The latest film by Nancy Meyers (What Women Want, Something's Gotta Give) is a dewy-eyed lark about the romantic possibilities of long-distance house-swapping. After Amanda (Cameron Diaz) in California and Iris (Kate Winslet) in England meet online—both suffering from relationship problems—they agree to exchange homes for a couple of weeks vacation, where (not surprisingly) both find new boyfriends—Jude Law and Jack Black, respectively. The problem with The Holiday is not that it's pure hokum squared, but rather that it's incredibly verbose (138 minutes worth, to be exact), without being either witty or charming. The film is also saddled with entirely too many fish-out-of-water sequences for the two female leads, and it's grossly manipulative, shamelessly dragging into the mix two adorable wide-eyed moppets, a scene-stealing dog, and a lovable old man for no compelling reason other than to milk viewer emotions. Not recommended. [Note: DVD extras include audio commentary by director Nancy Meyers (with guests composer Hans Zimmer and editor Joe Hutshing), an 18-minute “Foreign Exchange” making-of featurette, and trailers. Bottom line: a decent extras package for a throwaway comedy.] (F. Swietek)
The Holiday
Sony, 138 min., PG-13, DVD: $28.99, Mar. 13 Volume 22, Issue 2
The Holiday
Star Ratings
As of March 2022, Video Librarian has changed from a four-star rating system to a five-star one. This change allows our reviewers to have a wider range of critical viewpoints, as well as to synchronize with Google’s rating structure. This change affects all reviews from March 2022 onwards. All reviews from before this period will still retain their original rating. Future film submissions will be considered our new 1-5 star criteria.
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