Love Affairs - Nimm am besten was Du kriegst

I never really understood these kinds of films. What we have here are a group of people attracted to one another, and going through the throws of success, sex and life in some kind of hapless social foray. One that really doesn't produce any kind of result. No happy endings here, and for all of the attempt at humor, there isn't too much that's funny here.

In this sense it's sort of an old fashioned comedy; i.e. stuff that's not really funny to begin with, but is presented with a kind of humorous attitude. Beyond that, there isn't too much to be made of this film.

Mariel Hemingway is gorgeous as ever, and Colin Firth attempts to save a struggling film with superior thesping. The others hold their own in the acting department. Camera angles are fairly plain. There's nothing really inspiring about this film. It promised to be a sex comedy, but doesn't do much for either promise.

Watch at your own risk.

There's not much to it except for beautiful people (Mariel

Hemingway) and a few funny situations. Not so funny is a

repetitive theme of unprovoked violence, which was passed off as

slapstick but proved more painful than funny.

The one scene was the couple in the marriage counsellor's office,

only the counsellor was a personnel counsellor and a hapless

chap that was clearly over his head, especially when the lovely lady

straight-facedly asked the counsellor to ask her husband, why

does he not like to kiss me between my legs like he used to. After

a go-around like that, she asked the counsellor to ask her

husband why he doesn't want her to make love with him with her

mouth anymore. "Ask him all the places where I do it." The park,

the Metro... "THE METRO?"

That's the funniest part about a half hour before the end. It's all

downhill after that.

Carly Portland is the American star of British sitcom Tetford Gate produced by her husband Allen Portland. Ratings are falling so they bring in American writer Ben Greene. With time Ben falls for and marries the shows stunning French make-up artist Fiona Delgrazia. However it is not long before the feelings Ben has for Carly start to cause his relationship with Fiona to suffer. Meanwhile, he notices that Fiona and Allen are also getting close. Thus starts several years of relationship twists and turns between the four people.

I'm not entirely sure where to start with this film. On the surface it is some sort of romantic comedy but it doesn't really have much in it that makes for convincing "love" or indeed anything that I would describe as being all that funny. The end result is a film that never once engaged me and just came across as mistakenly thinking itself to be funnier and smarter than it actually was. So it moves along with dialogue that it cannot maintain and a confidence that it does not deserve to have. The fault for this must rest almost totally with writer and director Mike Binder. He has written characters that are not easy to relate to or understand or indeed even to like. The quartet of characters are poorly developed and they seem to do things for the sake of it; I'm not referring to their actions as people driven by lust (who can ever apply logic to such things) but specifically things like the fights outside pubs, which seemed to drop in from another film or be an idea that Binder had but had nobody working with him able to just say "you know what? this doesn't work").

As a result the film just flops long in a series of "ideas" without any real cohesion or reason to stick with it. The cast struggle and it shows. Binder himself seems to be under the illusion that he has written a modern relationship drama that will make him this generation's Woody Allen and as an actor he comes over like he knows it. It is a weak performance and he grated on me throughout. Firth is not as bad but just seems totally unsure of who he is playing. Hemingway is OK while Jacob is sexy as a presence but poor as a narrator. Small turns from Fry, Dee, Marcus and a few other well known faces do nothing really as they lack the material to work with.

Overall then a poor romantic comedy. The characters are poor and the actors cannot work with them or their dialogue as a result. The story and lives are unconvincing and there is not a spark of inspiration or wit to be had across the whole thing. I had never heard of this film before I recorded it a few weeks ago – now I understand why.

This movie is just crap! It's pointless, it isn't funny.

I just finished watching and write this in very fresh memory of this disappointing experience.

Not even Colin Firth manages to rescue some part of it. And since I'm a complete Firth-Lunatic, that's a weighty conclusion.

I can't even finally decide which movie is worse: The Playmaker or Londinium. Playmaker had at least the comfort of some very hot scenes under the shower which saved some of it. But this movie lacks any comfort of any kind.

And since in Germany you can only get it dubbed you cannot even listen to his beautiful voice but get this silly boyish dubbing voice.

The only slightly amusing scenes are those where Fiona and Allen try to solve their problems by consulting a therapist (Stephen Fry).

Well, actually it had some unintentional irony in it when Ben sees his play ruined by Carly (with the dying scene which was just illogic and silly). It was like "art imitating art" if this comparison might be allowed.. Though "art" might not be the right word for it.....

This movie is an utterly useless and completely unsuccessful attempt to do a Woody Allen Movie without the spirit, the wit and the timing of Woody Allen.

Over and over again I was just asking myself "WHAT??? You can't possibly be serious!!!"

Could anyone just explain to me PLEASE why those sudden outbreaks of hooliganism by Allen beating up everybody everytime outside the pub without any reason and doing innocent small talk during and after the act are supposed to be funny????That's not even weird, it's just stupid, silly, idiotic.....

Dear Fellow-Firthies, I know we all want to know every movie of ODB but I sincerely recommend to leave it to the very last, when there is no other Firth-movie left to watch (which I pray will never be!).

If curiosity overcomes you and you have to watch it before nevertheless be prepared and do have some good ODB-moments at hand to soothe the stale aftertaste....

Michael Binder the writer, director, and star of `Londinium' is clearly a Woody Allen wannabe. In my view that's not necessarily a bad thing. Unfortunately, this film is so derivative of Allen that one has to wonder why he isn't given due recognition in the credits. Contemporary London is here substituted for Allen's New York of the '70s and '80s. As in several of Allen's films of that period, the cityscape in `Londinium' dominates the film's cinematography, creating an urban tone poem of sorts as well as a sophisticated backdrop for the cross purpose comedy of courtship, sex, and marriage that constitutes the screenplay.

`Londinium' even brings back Mariel Hemingway, Woody's high school-aged love-interest in `Manhattan,' for a mid-life redaction of her earlier role. Binder himself seems to be auditioning for a part as `younger Woody' in a future Allen film. His character is a nearly complete borrowing of Woody's classic nebbish/lover/writer persona with a little Paul Reiser verbal inflection mixed in. The other two characters in the film's sexual foursome are played by the always-lovely-to-look at Irene Jacob, who provides the film's voiceover narrative for reasons that are never made clear, and Colin Firth (`Bridget Jones' Diary,' `Shakespeare in Love'), who once again offers up his unique (read: peculiar and off-putting) thuggish/romantic screen presence, taking it so far this time as to beating his friends and associates to a pulp whenever the impulse strikes. Actually, the fight impulse even overtakes the unlikely Ben Greene (the Binder character), producing an upper middle-class `Fight Club' scene that is supposed to be cathartic and funny, but just seems flat and dumb.

In addition to the leads, Stephen Fry (`Black Adder') has a very funny minor role as a proper British labor relations counselor who is pressed into unwilling service as a marriage/sex therapist. His scandalized reactions to some rather lurid confessions/accusations bandied by Jacob and Firth are the comic high point of an occasionally amusing, but mainly pretty dull and forgettable film.