Definitely, Maybe (2008) - B

Recently, I had a conversation with my good friend Jenny about the decline of the romantic comedy. It seems that so many romantic comedies these days are all about the "hook" which will make the movie look different enough in the previews and ads to draw viewers. Unfortunately, it seems most recent romantic comedies use up all their creative juices on the clever hook, and then simply fill the rest of the movie with completely generic characters, story, and dialogue.

The hook for "Definitely, Maybe" is that Will Hayes, played by Ryan Reynolds ("Just Friends" and "Blade: Trinity") is just about to get divorced, and his grade school daughter Maya, played by Abigail Breslin ("Little Miss Sunshine"), demands that he tell her the real story of how he met her mother. After trying to put her off with the explanation that "it's complicated," he eventually agrees to tell her the story, except that he is going to change all the names. Maya loves the idea of a "romantic mystery story" where she can try to figure out which of the women in the story is her mother.

Will's story prominently involves three very different women. The first is his girl-next-door college sweetheart Emily, played by Elizabeth Banks ("Seabiscuit" and "Invincible".) The story starts in 1992, as Will plans to move to New York City for two months to work for the presidential campaign of Bill Clinton. He promises Emily that nothing will change, and that he will be back after two months, but naturally she is worried.

Once he's in NYC, Will meets the other two women in the story. First, he meets April, played by Isla Fisher (she's the one who marries Vince Vaughn in "The Wedding Crashers,") because she works in the copy center of the Clinton campaign. She's the opposite of Will. He's hopelessly idealistic, optimistic, ambitious, and earnest, while she's a slacker, cynical, and apolitical since she doesn't think any of it makes a difference (she's working at the Clinton campaign because $12/hour is better than her last job--babysitting.)

He meets Summer, played by Rachel Weisz ("About a Boy" and "The Constant Gardner,") because Emily asks Will to deliver a mysterious package to Summer, who she knew during high school. Summer turns out to be a free-spirited (she immediately hits on Will when she meets him even though she is currently dating her thesis advisor--a really great minor role for Kevin Kline) and talented writer.

At a certain level, "Definitely, Maybe" fits the description of a hook followed up by generic characters, plot, and dialogue. I can't really point to anything in the movie that I would say was out of the ordinary for a romantic comedy, other than the fact that it just feels more real than most movies of its type. For example, each of the three female leads fits comfortably into a standard romantic comedy archetype. The three women feel quite real, though, because the parts are well written, and each of the actresses (especially Isla Fisher) delivers an appealing performance that makes them believable, and easy to relate to. The various beginnings and ends to Will's relationships are also fairly standard, except that they feel a little more true than usual.

The movie did have a few weak points. I usually actively hate Ryan Reynolds. Somehow the way he talks always makes me feel that he is sneering at everyone, which drives me crazy. Here, I found him tolerable, but certainly wished someone else would have played the lead. I almost really liked the ending, because I thought they were about to leave it deliciously ambiguous, but then at the last second the movie decides to beat you over the head with a happy ending. Those last seconds felt so false compared to the rest of the movie, I wondered if they were added after test screenings. On the bright side, though, I thought of a much worse, much sappier, much more "Hollywood" ending early in the movie, and was pleasantly surprised that it didn't go down that path at all.

I toyed briefly with the idea of giving "Definitely, Maybe" an A, but in the end I felt that it wasn't quite good enough. If you enjoy romantic comedies, this is one of the better ones in recent years, but it's probably not quite good enough to make people who don't really go for the genre like it.

Final Grade: B