Hollywood was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of its demise was signed by this movie and countless other samples of schlock. And Hollywood's name was good upon 'Change, for anything they chose to put their hand to. Hollywood was as dead as a door-nail.
Likewise dead were the US movie critics. Berardinelli gives it 2 1/2 because he's a twit. He even calls it 'easily-digestible'. Evidently he can swallow strange stuff. Justin Chang of Variety commits the ultimate indiscretion in calling the screenplay 'literate'.
Carina Chocano pegs it accurately however when she writes 'Must Love Dogs must not love movies very much'. And Neil Smith of the BBC hits the door nail right on the head when he writes that Lane's earlier Oscar nomination looks less and less deserved.
But it's not Lane's fault and it's certainly not Cusack's fault - in fact it's none of the actors fault - you can even see how poorly they're directed and how painful some of the scenes were to play.
Must Love Dogs is an insult: it's the kind of insult only a dead movie industry would dare come up with. It's effrontery. It perseveres only because said movie industry have a near 100% hegemony in the domestic theatre market. Even Turkish romantic comedies - if there are such - would rate better than this.
Need someone to blame? Go all the way back. This abomination was supposedly based on a novel. By one Claire Cook. So start there. Next on the chopping block is Gary David Goldberg who unequivocally demonstrated his lack of talent by writing the screenplay. Goldberg is also the director and producer, so he's into this up past his eyeballs.
Warner Bros and Fox are involved in financing and distributing it, so they're on the firing line too.
But the ultimate cinema criminal here has got to be the boob who suggested taking this abortion and making it into a movie in the first place.
Shoot them all.
Likewise dead were the US movie critics. Berardinelli gives it 2 1/2 because he's a twit. He even calls it 'easily-digestible'. Evidently he can swallow strange stuff. Justin Chang of Variety commits the ultimate indiscretion in calling the screenplay 'literate'.
Carina Chocano pegs it accurately however when she writes 'Must Love Dogs must not love movies very much'. And Neil Smith of the BBC hits the door nail right on the head when he writes that Lane's earlier Oscar nomination looks less and less deserved.
But it's not Lane's fault and it's certainly not Cusack's fault - in fact it's none of the actors fault - you can even see how poorly they're directed and how painful some of the scenes were to play.
Must Love Dogs is an insult: it's the kind of insult only a dead movie industry would dare come up with. It's effrontery. It perseveres only because said movie industry have a near 100% hegemony in the domestic theatre market. Even Turkish romantic comedies - if there are such - would rate better than this.
Need someone to blame? Go all the way back. This abomination was supposedly based on a novel. By one Claire Cook. So start there. Next on the chopping block is Gary David Goldberg who unequivocally demonstrated his lack of talent by writing the screenplay. Goldberg is also the director and producer, so he's into this up past his eyeballs.
Warner Bros and Fox are involved in financing and distributing it, so they're on the firing line too.
But the ultimate cinema criminal here has got to be the boob who suggested taking this abortion and making it into a movie in the first place.
Shoot them all.