Anthony Iessi
You will be ashamed of me, but as a man with an eclectic taste for films, every now and then, I must take in a guilty pleasure. The Heartbreak Kid is a forgotten Farrelly Bros. gross-out comedy. Understandably, audiences and critics thought it was a bit much. Critics lambasted it for being mean-spirited. Compared to There's Something About Mary, I admit, there is no shred of sweetness in any of the characters here. They are all despicable. Stiller's character especially. A low-life, cheating, scumbag if there ever was one. The film wants you to root for him... in finding the sexier, saner woman over Stiller's troubled newlywed. Everything about that is wrong, wrong, wrong. But that's the joke. The Heartbreak Kid thrives on cringe humor. I'd say, in a similar vein to Curb Your Enthusiasm. It's funny, particularly because the situation is so horrible. Then you pair it up with the endless gross-out humor that the Farrelly's are famous for, but this time, on steroids. Jokes about pubic hair, urine, devastating sunburns, jellyfish attacks and things that should never be up someone's nose. The traveling mariachi band particularity had me rolling. It all works, except for one joke with a Donkey that genuinely went way too far. The Heartbreak Kid is not great cinema. It's trash. But it's funny trash and that's better than nothing.
Takeshi-K
Ben Stiller plays Eddie the titular heartbreak kid in this vaguely amusing, but ultimately unrewarding romantic comedy. The story finds Eddie wallowing in sad sack single loneliness. Ben Stiller's real life father, Jerry Stiller, plays his father in the movie and their relationship is based on the latter nitpicking Eddie for not settling down and getting married yet and not much else. So Eddie marries the first girl that takes his fancy, Lila, played by the beautiful and talented actress Malin Akerman. Lila turns out to be a nightmare and Eddie quickly regrets his rash decision.While on their honeymoon he meets a lovely girl played by Michelle Monahan. He of course tries to hide the fact that he is newly married, she finds out and of course rejects him. Instead of fighting and winning her back, the film simply ends with Eddie finding some other random girl basically revealing to us in a none too subtle fashion that he was never worthy of love in the first place, just as this film never deserved our applause or respect. The Woman he ends up with may have been his wife all along, we aren't really sure, not that anyone cares about Eddie's love life anymore. There are indeed a few good laughs, but it lacks the cleverness of the Farrelly Brothers better efforts. Even if it did though nothing could make up for such a tawdry loveless finale. Hint to screenwriters: People prefer romantic comedies that end with the main character not just finding love, but deserving it.
drystyx
A man is on his honeymoon with an absolute knockout beauty heart throb, and he decides to divorce her because some more average looking woman tells him she has her spot on the beach.There's nothing to like about this movie, and nothing to care for about this guy. It is hard to say whether this is as poor as THE GRADUATE, but this is pretty much the same movie. A control freak guy simply wants to make the world a worse place for as many people as he can.I sat through it to review it, but that's the only reason to sit through it.Eddie Albert provides the "star" attraction as the father of the average girl next door. His role is poorly written. For some reason, he goes off on a rant at a situation that most men would just laugh at. The Ben Stiller character asks for his blessing to divorce on a honeymoon with a knockout to marry the daughter.This is "par" for the course for Stiller, though, who shows nothing, and who chooses the worst and dullest scripts one can imagine. The saddest thing is that so much money was wasted for something with zero inspiration and imagination, when there are real scripts out there with inspiration and imagination being passed over by self righteous maniacs like Stiller.
SnoopyStyle
Eddie (Ben Stiller) is a hopeless romantic. His father Doc (Jerry Stiller) can't understand why he doesn't crush more cookies after Jodi. His friend Mac (Rob Corddry) is an annoying jerk. Lila (Malin Akerman) gets robbed by a purse snatcher and Eddie tries to help. They start dating. When her environmental research job forces her to Rotterdam, he decides to keep her in San Francisco by marrying her after only 6 weeks of dating. They go to Cabo for the honeymoon. Soon he discovers all her craziness and he starts questioning his decision. While in Cabo, Eddie falls Miranda (Michelle Monaghan) and he has to break off with Lila while trying to keep the truth from Miranda. Her cousin Martin (Danny McBride) doesn't trust him at all.Ben Stiller is trying to be the everyman. Malin Akerman is flailing away too much. It's like dying from a thousand different cuts. It doesn't make Ben Stiller any more likable. He comes off as shallow with every twitch at Akerman's craziness and every lie he tells. Michelle Monaghan is perfectly nice but Malin Akerman was perfectly nice before the Farrellys got through with her.The Farrelly brothers are missing something in this. I think it's missing a good heart. The main problem is that every character is an annoying outlandish cartoon. Even the nice people are annoyingly unlikeable. That's not necessary and rather distracting. There are some funny moments. Some of the wacky Farrelly brothers jokes actually work. The overall story doesn't work that well.
AD
