Best Friends

'Love and Other Catastrophes' lends a hand in portraying the true to life problems that go along with either falling or staying in love. For example; you force yourself upon a certain person for an extended period of time, while forcing yourself to love them, only to find out that you were merely settling for someone you didn't love to simply fill a void in your life. Then a person comes out of the blue you never would have expected and in turn you fall in love with them. This moves also proves the old adage that you don't know what you have until it's gone. Whilst doing so in a roundabout way, it is your basic love story with a sharp sense of humor and a twist of that 90's character edge that we have all grown to love. Truly one of the better movies of the decade.

"Love and Other Catastrophes" is co-written and co-produced by a Jewish Australian woman, makes some jokes on Woody Allen, and doesn't repeat any of his stereotypes.

There's an interesting Jewish character or two - including a guy named Ari who is a lothario and a guy considering a circumcision due to the demands of his Jewish girlfriend.

It fits nicely in the genre of twentysomething roommates seeking love, i.e. "Singles," "Kicking and Screaming," etc.

The lesbian couple is treated completely naturally and romantically and is really the most interesting couple. None of the guys even assume the lesbian's straight best friend is gay, as I think would happen in most American films.

The film student satires are a bit heavy handed, but on a whole it's a cute, funny first-time movie casually made.

I only recognized two songs out of the whole soundtrack as it was filled with Australian rock 'n' roll I've never heard before.

(originally written 4/2/1997)

An excellent film. Many will miss the references to life, mainly due to not living it. But it struck a major chord with those that have. A must see if you have enjoyed your college years, or are pursuing them now. A good reference for those attempting fate.

When a movie lover like me is watching a movie like this one, his heart becomes happy, really happy. The characters love movies, they are talking seriously about them, with some respectuous words. I hope that the director of this one will going far in her career because she has a lot of talent.

This film is for anyone who's in (or was in) university and fallen 'victim' to a bureaucratic bungle. As the title says, the film focuses on "love and other catastrophes", the "catastrophes" being many problems young people face such as the one above-mentioned, moving out of home finding a place to live, fitting into a new environment, making new friends and finding your own identity. The "love" aspect is about finding your one true love and whether or not he/she exists, and if they do not exist, do you settle for someone who does not fit all your "criteria"? I give this film 8/10. I would have preferred it to be longer, even though the ending was quite good. All the characters are likeable and unique, Frances O'Connor does a great job at playing Mia. I highly recommend this film to anyone especially those in the 18-25ish age group.