3x3: Least convincing movie couples

I thought Cate was really great with Frodo at least.

She played the lofty hot chick elf who has a husband but seems flirty and he’s all “sproing”, then she scares the shit out of him with her crazy bitch act and he’s like “yeeps” then she gives him a magical flashlight instead of crazy lovin and he’s like “I totally got the better deal there, Celeborn can keep her.”

Ahem–

Warren Beatty and Halle Berry in Bulworth. I have no idea what Halle Berry’s character saw in this guy, but the whole movie played out like wish fulfillment on Warren Beatty’s part. Beatty has been known to repeatedly remind Hollywood that he was as much of a sex symbol in his day as Clooney, Pitt or Hoffman are today, and to me it has always made him sound resentful and desperate… This movie didn’t help.

Morgan Freeman
and Beverly Todd in The Bucket List. I don’t know why Hollywood typically casts (as in, like 99% of the time) Morgan Freeman in sexless roles (without wives or girlfriends or boyfriends or, pretty much, sexy in any way), but it works for him. Seeing him emote love-related emotions was wrong, all wrong, and it didn’t work for me.

Mr. and Mrs Smith. Sure, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie might be a real life item now, but their relationship really didn’t work for me here.

Really? It didn’t bother me at all the time, but maybe I should go back and check it out again. . . .

Written by, directed by, produced by and starring Warren Beatty.

It was wish fulfillment on Warren Beatty’s part.

Good call. I was pretty close on this one because this film pissed me off so thoroughly, but I couldn’t divorce my feelings about the couple from my feelings about how unremittingly awful the film itself was. Just terrible.

Also—and I’m kind of stealing from Kelly Wand here—how can you have a film called The Time Traveler’s Wife and cast Rachel McAdams* and make us stare at a naked dude for two hours?

Come on! Throw us a bone! (so to speak)

-xtien

“Her dad is a Republican. And a hunter.”

*Also, I’m putting this way down here because…DUDE, you had to Google that?!? Dude.

Having met your lovely and incredibly charming wife I gladly concede the point. The same was true of her here in LA.

Well said.

-xtien

I’ve never even heard of Rachel McAdams. We don’t all have subscriptions to People magazine, y’know.

Obviously, this is Burgess Meredith.

Woody Allen and Scarlett Johansen in about 3 of his recent movies.

Aw, you beat me to it, Hanz!

Heath Ledger and Shannyn Sossamon, A Knight’s Tale. You watch this tepid yarn about jousting in Ye Olden Tymes and it is all about Ledger trying to win the favor of Sossamon’s heart, but she doesn’t seem worth all that to me. The spunky Irish blacksmithess (or whatever) played by Laura Fraser is a much more appealing object d’amor.


Roger Moore and Grace Jones, A View to a Kill.
Oh, '80s, what didn’t you try! Sorry, Grace Jones was too busy being scary than sexy like, ever. That isn’t to say I don’t like her; she was hilarious in Boomerang. Speaking of Eddie Murphy films:


Eddie Murphy and Jasmine Guy, Harlem Nights.
Sheesh, way to take the only decent romantic pairing in the film and throw it away callously. This film - mildly entertaining at best - was so preoccupied with portraying sex and love as nothing but tools of deceit, it was really off-putting. I am guessing it was made around the time Murphy divorced his wife (which nearly ruined Raw IMO)

For me it’s Slumdog Millionaire. I never believed that relationship for a second and it was pretty much the failing of the movie for me.

The Batman Begins thing doesn’t bug me because it’s not the center of the story.

In Roger Moore’s autobiography he mentions that he and Grace didn’t get on very well on set probably didn’t help the performance.

A thousand times yes. Sossamon was wooden as hell and on top of that basically an angry bitch. I can’t think of anything I’ve ever liked Sossamon in. And what the fuck was up with her hair dos in the movie? Dear god. Spunky Irish Blacksmithess was hot and prone to snark, but not a total bitch.

Boy, you like the word bitch. I don’t really remember Sossamon being angry in Knights Tale at all.

Scarlett Johansen and pretty much anybody. Girl’s incredibly hot, but she always plays aloof that it’s hard to belief that she’d genuinely like anybody. She works best as the object of desire, but never as part of a couple.

Natalie Portman and Hayden Christensen - Fuck Star wars.

Adam Sandler and anybody else that wasn’t Emily Watson. - The Ben Stiller syndrome.

Portman and Christensen in Star Wars, undoubtedly. It didn’t work for a single second, and pretty much all their scenes are incredibly cringeworthy due to their performances and the script. Lucas is such a hack.

If I may include a tv show couple: Naveen Andrews and Maggie Grace in Lost.

Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi in Ghost World - Buscemi is perfectly cast as the ugly schlub stand-in for Terry Zwigoff, but Thora Birch is just too hot to be believable as Enid. They attempt to frump up and punk down Ms. Birch, but, for me, this has the opposite effect, making her even more smoking hot. Even more hotter than her friend Scarlett Johansen. (Cue Kelly Wand “rowr” noise)

Jerry Seinfeld and Renee Zellweger in Bee Movie - Sure, he is a bumblebee and she is a woman, but it could work; just look at King Kong. Hmm…now that I think of it, this movie is kind of a mirror universe King Kong, but it sucks. Seinfeld is just such an annoying character, essentially a guy that just doesn’t want to work and would rather go outside and play and hit on giant women of different species. Zellweger is basically a non-existant cipher…did anyone know that was her? Contrast this with Holly Hunter performance in The Incredibles and…well, it’s not even worth it. Poop. I do really like Zellweger in Leatherheads, though…anyone?

Billy Bob Thornton and Holly Berri (Holli Berry?) in Monster’s Ball - Holli Berri is just terrible, pretty much all the time. Catwoman, Robots, Swordfish, X-Men. Enough with the Halle Beary Hollywood! (cue Kelly Wand “racist” noise)

I will hang with just about any movie, even a really bad one, just to see where it’s going. Just in case. I couldn’t finish this one. 45 minutes in I realized I still had another 45 to go and I just turned to my wife and said, “I can’t do it.” I think she said, “Thank God.”

Just aggressively unfunny. Inert.

-xtien

Did you even see any of them? Of the three movies he’s directed with Scarlett Johansson in the cast – being Match Point, Scoop, and Vicky Christina Barcelona – he only appeared in one (Match Point). Unless you’re just objecting to his casting her in his films, in which case, fine by me.

She didn’t exactly light up the screen with Javier Bardem or Penelope Cruz in Vicky Christina Barcelona. Now, Rebecca Hall and Javier Bardem, or Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem, on the other hand… You could cut the tension with a knife.