So for whatever reason I saw a preview of this movie Endless Love that is coming out today, on Valentine's Day 2014. I want to encourage you all, if you have plans to see it tonight, to abort those plans. Romantically speaking, you'd be better off re-watching Silver Linings Playbook. Spoiler alert.
1. It steals everything that can be stolen from the far-superior teen romance film Say Anything, mainly the plot.
There's a girl with good grades who doesn't have any friends. A dude from the wrong side of the tracks has a crush on her. Despite his friends' warnings, he pursues her. There's a wild graduation party which validates her and makes her feel one with the normal kids. He has dinner with the family and the dad interrogates him awkwardly. Her dad has a dark secret. The big problem is she is going away to a fancy school at the end of the summer. They eventually end up on a plane. The only plot beat that deviates from Say Anything at all is the part where a house catches fire, and the main characters are, unfortunately, not consumed by an inferno.
2. It steals actual dialogue from Say Anything.
Before they make love for the first time, it's raining or cold or something, and the gal says,"You're shaking." He replies, "Good shaking." This is basically exactly what they say in the car-consummation scene in Say Anything, except somehow in Cameron Crowe's film it conveyed a true moment of happiness, and in Endless Love 2014 it is just some crap that two idiots say before hooking up.
3. The screenplay was written by someone who has never loved anyone.
The movie is not even about love, exactly. It is much more about gender role definition via the Cosmo/Details magazine school of male/female fantasy ideals. The guy is handsome and tall; complicated without being intelligent; deferent but he punches anyone who disrespects his girl; good with cars. The girl is blonde and rich, and that's pretty much all we know about her. (We are asked to believe that she is smart because her father pulls strings to get her into medical school.)
4. The writer of the original novel doesn't like it.
Scott Spencer, author of the novel Endless Love (credited as the source material for this film as well as the 1981 Endless Love, starring Brooke Shields and Who Gives A Hoot) writes eloquently on what happens when Hollywood makes your book into two movies in The Paris Review.
5. It stars a British guy doing an American accent who has a black sidekick doing an Ebonic accent.
We know the hero's okay because his best friend is black and funny and is named "Mace." He also is a good singer and dancer and way more charismatic than the lead character. Somehow, Mace does not die. But neither does he truly live.
6. It is kind of white privilegey.
It is a white-privileged idea that love can include pursuing a girl to the point of stalking, and she will somehow interpret it as dedication. I mean, this also happens in Say Anything, but there it's more cute.
7. The music is terrible.
The song "Endless Love" doesn't happen. "In Your Eyes" doesn't happen. Honestly I would've settled for a song from fucking Dawson's Creek.
8. It isn't enough about the two fathers.
The only potentially interesting part of this flick is the conflict between the two fathers, played by Bruce Greenwood and Robert Patrick, a.k.a. Captain Pike vs. the T-1000. Here are two men, caught between the indignant stupidity of their children and their own personal grief, who must make hard decisions regarding the future of their families. You could make a good movie about that. Or you could make Endless Love.
9. The two lead actors are way too pretty.
They are that kind of pretty that is not even good-looking. They are like schematics for how to draw a person. After a while you kind of want to shoot them.
10. It gives you really bad advice for life.
Many films perpetrate the convenient idea that "you must fight for love, because love is all that matters." A good film makes you believe it. Looking at you, Slumdog Millionaire.
11. At one point there is a joke where the dad confuses Hulu for Uber.
It's cute until you realize that this will be the high point of witticism for the entire movie.
12. It will make you angry at women.
Because evidently all women want is a dull hunk of meat who will punch their dad.
13. It will make you angry at men.
Because apparently all men want is the bland rich girl they never talked to in high school.
14. Because, love.
Love is still important, as Michael Jackson said. ("Love, L-O-V-E.") Love deserves films like Say Anything and Wall-E and Punch-Drunk Love and Love Actually and Broadcast News. Love is a thing that happens between people, not Hollywood-composite perfect-hair androids. So, in the name of love, let Endless Love bomb.
Love is still important, as Michael Jackson said. ("Love, L-O-V-E.") Love deserves films like Say Anything and Wall-E and Punch-Drunk Love and Love Actually and Broadcast News. Love is a thing that happens between people, not Hollywood-composite perfect-hair androids. So, in the name of love, let Endless Love bomb.
