Thou shalt not try to capitalize on Tracy-Hepburn style when cliche is your only evidence, but Laws of Attraction tries to.
By PHILIP BOOTH
Published April 29, 2004
[Photo: New Line Cinema]
Pierce Brosnan, left, and Julianne Moore work to achieve a high-spirited romantic comedy in Laws of Attraction, but deliver a mistrial.
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Maybe what Laws of Attraction needs is a TV laugh track. That way, we'd know what's supposed to be funny in this so-called screwball comedy.
As it is, we're left cold. Pierce Brosnan and Julianne Moore, as battling New York divorce attorneys who fall for each other, have about as much chemistry as Sean Penn and the paparazzi, only their scenes together aren't nearly as intriguing.
Their repartee, meant to remind us of the Spencer Tracy-Katharine Hepburn classic Adam's Rib, is bland and cliched. The dialogue, written by Aline Brosh McKenna (Three to Tango) and Robert Harling (The Evening Star), dies on the lips of the actors, whose scenes are awkwardly staged by Johnny English director Peter Howitt. And the story is predictable: We've all been there before and had hoped never to return.
Moore, a gifted actor inexplicably going for the smart-and-cute-but-ditzy persona abandoned by Meg Ryan and recently perfected by Reese Witherspoon, is Audrey Miller, a Harvard-educated lawyer who has all but given up on love. The screenwriters burden Moore's character with fastidiousness and a fetish for the Weather Channel. Fascinated yet?
Her new nemesis in court is Daniel Rafferty (Brosnan), just returned to the East Coast from California, a dashing fellow who presents himself in the guise - shaggy one day, impeccable the next - that will best serve his client. Brosnan, perhaps because of his job as an executive producer on the film, gets a little more to work with, though neither performer stretches.
Laws of Attraction, not to be confused with 2002's The Rules of Attraction, is filled with by-the-numbers scenes. One such sequence takes place at a Spanish restaurant and dance club, where the relatively laidback Daniel has taken the notably uptight Audrey. Two or three exotic drinks later, she has loosened up to the point of going home with her dinner partner.
Later, in Ireland (don't ask why), home to several of the movie's most charming scenes, another bout of drinking leads to another rash decision, and Daniel and Audrey must battle the press, and each other, before finding a resolution.
One running joke concerns Audrey's mom, Sara (Frances Fisher), at age 56 still dressed like a leather-clad teenage rock 'n' roll groupie, hitting on much younger guys, regularly remaking her face with plastic surgery and collagen injections. Like practically everything else in Laws, the humor falls flat.
Laws of Attraction
Grade: D
Director: Peter Howitt
Cast: Pierce Brosnan, Julianne Moore, Michael Sheen, Parker Posey, Frances Fisher, Nora Dunn
Screenplay: Aline Brosh McKenna and Robert Harling
