French Kiss Blu-ray Review
Like a lot of kisses, this one's enjoyable but a little sloppy.
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, January 11, 2013
Why oh why do some actresses feel they need to chop their faces to bits with plastic surgery? Now this isn't a sexist
commentary, for it's only too obvious that Hollywood
actors are at least as guilty of this folly (as one look at
Mickey Rourke eminently proves). But for some reason women seem more amenable to going under the knife,
sometimes repeatedly, until they look like weird alien
doppelgangers of their former selves. It's especially odd
when there's nothing wrong with their original faces to begin with. It's one thing to have a little eye lift or neck tuck as
the effects of gravity's solemn pull suck a face ever downward through the decades, but how do you account for still
relatively youthful actresses who reshape their faces to meet some ideal that evidently only they are privy to? This is
neither here nor there in terms of relating to any given performer or their body (no pun intended) of work, but it's
something that occurs perhaps unconsciously to
this viewer when he sees "former" versions of actresses on
display. On television, I still start almost involuntarily when I see Courteney Cox in
Cougar Town these days.
What
has she done to herself? Is it "only" almost ridiculously plumped lips, or is her nose completely different?
A few years ago I reviewed the 2008 remake of the iconic Claire Booth Luce play
The Women for another site, and I marveled then at the
seemingly inexplicable "change" that star Meg Ryan had put herself through, in my opinion not to the actresses'
betterment. Is it mere coincidence that Ryan has more or less disappeared from the acting scene? Is perhaps even
she aware of how radically her surgery has altered her appearance? Well, for those jonesin' for the "old,
unimproved" cute as a button look of Meg Ryan, you could do worse than
French Kiss, a not quite light enough
soufflé that nonetheless shows why so many once fell in love with Ryan, deeming her a new version of "America's
Sweetheart".
There's no denying that a lot of
French Kiss is derivative. Meg Ryan plays pretty much the same character she
always played in these rom-coms, in this case a perky but slightly anal woman named Kate (a character name she
would
repeat several years later in
another rom-com,
Kate & Leopold). Kevin Kline plays a French roué named Luc, a petty thief who has dreams of
starting a vineyard and who comes across as a more intelligent French accented version of his character in
A Fish Called Wanda. And
that
old standby of so many rom-coms, two disparate characters who are obviously meant for each other but who can't
stand
each other at first, is on full display. Against these considerable, odds, however, quite a bit of
French Kiss
works
remarkably well.
Kate has her life planned down to every jot and tittle. Her fiancé, doctor Charlie (Timothy Hutton), keeps begging her to
live a little and come with him to Paris, but Kate's debilitating fear of flying keeps her from ever seriously considering it.
Kate is closer to Charlie's family than Charlie himself is, and she also has selected the picket fenced home that she
wants to settle down with Charlie in, surprising Charlie with the announcement that she's squirreled away over forty
thousand dollars to help pay for it. All of these plans come tumbling down like a veritable house of cards when Charlie
goes to Paris and quickly falls in love with a French woman he describes as a "god-dess" (emphasis on the second
syllable), ditching Kate without so much as a second thought.
That spurs Kate to at least momentarily get
beyond her fear, and we next find her fidgeting in an airplane seat.
Through the vagaries of coincidence, or at least whatever passes for it in the typical territory of the rom-com, Kate ends
up seated next to Luc (Kevin Kline) and it is of course hate at first sight. Kate doesn't like Luc for being French,
unkempt and a little pushy, and Luc finds Kate uptight and afraid to have fun. Over the course of the long flight from
Canada to Paris the two do exchange increasingly tolerant conversation, helped along by Luc plying Kate with alcohol
he's pilfered from the plane's galley. We're also privy to seeing Luc unwrap some items he's evidently attempting to
smuggle into France, items he ends up placing in Kate's purse while she sleeps after having had too much to drink.
The rest of
French Kiss attempts to dally in some farce like material, as Kate's purse gets stolen by another no-
goodnik whom Luc knows. Luc is able to reclaim a prized grapevine, but an even
more prized diamond necklace
can't be located and so Luc sets out to tail Kate in the hopes that the jewels are still stashed away in her purse. Kate,
meanwhile, now without any money or her passport, and through a series of plot devices unable to return to either
Canada
or America, sets her sights on bringing Charlie to his senses. In the meantime a police inspector (Jean
Reno) is hot on the trail of Luc, knowing that he is involved in the original theft of the necklace.
Perhaps surprisingly,
French Kiss never really amps up to the hysterical level of
A Fish Called Wanda,
even though several of the "slamming door" set ups are there in place. Perhaps even more surprisingly, the film
manages to be rather engaging even if the comedy is often quite low key, resulting in smiles and titters rather than out
and out guffaws. The film coasts quite elegantly on the combined charisma of Kline and Ryan, and it is helped
immeasurably by director Lawrence Kasdan's very evocative use of several incredibly gorgeous French locations.
Still, there's a certain aspect of wistful nostalgia watching this film and wondering how Meg Ryan could have hobbled
her own career by deciding to alter what were at the very least extremely cute and some would argue absolutely
gorgeous good looks. It may admittedly have absolutely nothing to do with this film and its slight but undeniable
pleasures, but it's still a cautionary tale for today's fledgling stars.
