10 Things We Should Do Before We Break Up

It seems many negative reviews are here because viewers wanted it to be a different kind of movie. Taken for what it is my wife and I found it worthwhile. Not great but worthwhile. Probably a 6 of 10 rating.

The two main characters, each near 40, arrange to meet at a bar, he has a girlfriend, she is single with two kids, a boy and a girl about 7 and 9 respectively. They get along OK but drink too much that initial meeting and not long after she finds out she is pregnant. Much of the story is "what to do?"

To me it plays on a concept that I learned back when my wife and I started dating, you really need to give a new relationship four seasons, a year at least, to see if you are genuinely compatible. Things will happen, holidays will come and go, through the process each will discover the true other (hopefully). We dated almost 2 1/2 years and last month we celebrated our 30th anniversary. We knew what we were getting into back in 1992.

The two in this story decide to stick together after only a few weeks and predictably it causes a number of unforeseen problems. She was already a mother with a career, she had developed responsibility, he was somewhat the opposite.

We enjoyed it for the relationship issues, we watched it at home on Amazon streaming.

I'll be honest, I didn't expect much when I dared to watch this film, in fact, from the very first scene I thought "Gosh, this seems like one of those cheesy and nonsense Lifetime movies" (and it's kind of like that), but even though I would not say this is the greatest movie ever, I would neither say it's a terrible one; "10 Things We Should Do Before We Break Up" is an actually interesting movie for a good hour, seriously though, I'm the most impatient person and I didn't feel like "OMG, end up already" since it's in fact a pretty short movie. Talking about a deeper manner, characters are not great though and a lot of people say they're actually unbearable, I might not disagree but at least I'd say they're not perfect but human.

The plot is simple but slow for almost an hour, the final stage of her pregnancy goes very fast and we, as an audience, just feel really cold about it, the finale is just "meh", I'd say is unpredictable because I never thought they would dare to end it just like that like I get the fact they're not meant to be, but there's no catharsis, neither an evolution of the characters. By the end, I was just like, "Really?"

Anyway, I'm giving it a 4 since I liked the first part, only that.

At no point in the movie do you feel anything for the characters, and you don't believe they feel anything for eachother. everyone is so cold towards everyone else. lines they say seem to be like someone throwing bricks on the pile, hoping they make up something resembling the wall. everything that happens happens too fast, for no reason, no one's motivation is clear, it looks like someone had cut scenes from bunch of movies, and managed to combined them into something that sort of resembles coherent story if you ignore all the grating gaps. it's sad to have talented actors waste time on nonsense such as this

With a 70 minute running time you'd think this would be on the short and lightweight side, but the opposite is true. Two very fine lead performances and a grown-up approach to its subject give us a poignant snapshot of a relationship. Things may not work out the way we want them to, but that's what happens when a film maker tries to give us a slice of life instead of crowd-pleasing cliches. And Galt Niederhoffer deserves particular credit for telling the story with economy. It would have been easy to pad it out with another 10-15 minutes to give it a more conventional running time, but that would have detracted from an intelligent, worthwhile movie.

Abigail (Christina Ricci) is meeting her friend Kate at a bar. It's actually a setup for a blind date with Benjamin Conway (Hamish Linklater). He suggests making a list of ten things to do before they break up. It leads to an one-night stand and a pregnancy for the mother of two.

This is an indie. It's a relatively short indie. I don't sense the chemistry between Ricci and Linklater. They have some cute scenes but non of them achieve relationship takeoff. These are two good actors who are keeping their energy at a medium and that makes their relationship a bit at a medium. When a downturn happens, it doesn't have quite the shock value. The one truly off-putting scene is the best friend. I don't get her attitude. The scene crashes headlong into politics and I don't get it. I don't know anyone like this person. The movie is not fun enough. When it's edgy, it gets awkward. I love these two actors and it's not their problem. The title is fun but the ten things don't matter. This indie has a few interesting ideas and two good leads. It also has a few bad ideas and the leads aren't maximized. Even the closing text frustrated me. Maybe it would be better to have an actual scene to depict their relationship.