Alex & Emma Movie Review:


Director Rob Reiner, Kate Hudson and Luke Wilson have decided to square-off against a green-skinned behemoth. They are packing a weapon to help stall the green goliath. What is their secret weapon? Heart-strings, of course.

Alex (Luke Wilson) is a starving-blocked writer who must finish his follow-up to his best-selling novel in 30 days or risk being pummeled to death by two large Cubans. Enter Emma (Kate Hudson), a stenographer who is aspiring to work at a prestigious law firm until she is duped into showing up at Alex’s door. Their first meeting isn’t exactly heavenly but eventually Emma decides to help desperate Alex. Can their team-up and collaboration save Alex from certain doom? And what the hell is Alex’s book about anyway?

Director Rob Reiner ventures back into the foray of romantic comedies with "Alex & Emma". Reiner is still most fondly remembered for directing "When Harry Met Sally", which is regarded as one of, if not the best romantic comedy of all time.

Even though "Alex & Emma" isn’t going to be remembered as a classic it does have its tender and sweet side. There are some delightful moments for Hudson who takes on four roles for this film. In each of her incarnations you do have to crack a grin because she has such a beautiful and infectious way with the camera. This kind of role for Kate reminded me a lot of her mother, Goldie Hawn, in her earlier work. It is amazing how much of Goldie is in her daughter.

I also liked seeing Luke Wilson in a leading role. Wilson is always so laid back and very comfortable on screen and you get this coming home feeling when he’s on screen. My only problem with Wilson is that he needs to develop a range in his career. He always seems to be playing the same guy.

I have to remark on Sophie Marceau in this film as well. Like Monica Bellucci after her, Marceau is one of Europe’s great imports. Marceau is a brilliant French actress and she needs to be used more in Hollywood. I liked her as the tormented socialite in the 1920s here. The film just didn’t support her character.

The sad thing about "Alex & Emma" is that I was more interested in the goings-on within Alex’s novel than what was happening between the writer and his typist. It was almost like "The Great Gatsby" which really intrigued me. There was so much potential for the conflict between the real-world and novel-world. I wanted to see more of a struggle. The filmmakers could have had so much fun with that.

"Alex & Emma" is a delightfully basic comedy, which doesn’t capitalize on what it could be. The performances and leads are memorable but not poignant. However it is a great movie to get brownie points, guys.

(3 out of 5)

So Says the Soothsayer.

Dean Kish

Like with When Harry Met Sally and The American President, Rob Reiner once again explores the relationship of two opposite romantic partners in Alex & Emma.

The audience is first introduced to Alex (Luke Wilson), who is a novelist that has a harsh case of writer’s block with his next novel. Two muscular
Cuban thugs rudely arrive and threaten to drop him from his balcony window if he doesn’t pay them the $100,000 in gambling debt that was accumulated from their boss. Alex’s new novel is his way out of the situation, but he will not get the money until the novel is finished. The loansharks give him exactly 30 days to finish the novel and pay up. Desperate, Alex gains the services of a critical stenographer named Emma (Kate Hudson) to help him finish the novel. As the novel begins to come to life, the film cuts back and forth from the writer/stenographer to the actual setting of the novel’s characters through
development and progression. Luke Wilson and Kate Hudson double up in roles by playing characters in the novel as well. As the book begins to lay itself out, Alex notices that Emma is sort of a muse to him, and both find themselves going
through the same moments as the characters in the novel.

Rob Reiner is a director that knows how to capture relationship growth and interaction. His work in Alex & Emma isn’t great, but well toned. Reiner’s transitions of jumping from Alex’s gloomy apartment to the bright atmosphere of the novel are also crucial to the film. It did seem that Reiner had
trouble closing up the film, with some important scenes taking longer than needed.

Screenwriter Jeremy Leven also brings back a distant subplot and cliché dialogue into the last twenty minutes of the film. Leven does not let the
story go wearily overboard, in which it could have easily done. The interactions between Alex and Emma are likeable, but some of the scenes in the novel setting are just silly. Leven script does follow the traditional formula for a lighthearted romantic comedy.

Luke Wilson and Kate Hudson share great balanced chemistry as the two title characters. As Alex, Wilson is more patient than usual, unlike his work in Old School. Hudson shows a simple comic delivery that has always been lost or overshadowed in her previous roles. The two leads also have fun with their roles as the novel’s characters, especially Hudson who plays a Swedish, German and Spanish maid. Sophie Marceau also arises as Alex’s love interest in the novel; her performance is noticeably overdone.

Alex & Emma is an enjoyable romantic date movie that offers nothing groundbreaking, it is just a cute little film. The captured interactive relationships is something that Rob Reiner is one of the best at and the delightful chemistry between Wilson and Hudson is the highlight of the film.

Grade: B-

Joseph C. Tucker

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