'Ghosts of Girlfriends Past' review

Jennifer Garner and Matthew McConaughey (Credit: Ron Batzdorff/Warner Bros.)

Photos:

Q&A: Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Garner

‘Ghosts of Girlfriends Past’ stars on lessons in love

Womanizing photographer Connor Mead (Matthew McConaughey) has a big wake-up call in store when he leaves town for a weekend to attend his brother’s (Breckin Meyer) wedding. Not only does Connor reunite with the one who got away—his ex-girlfriend and first love Jenny Perotti (Jennifer Garner)—but he’s visited by four “ghosts” including his Uncle Wayne (Michael Douglas), who schooled him in the playboy lifestyle but now warns that it only leads to loneliness and misery. If you haven’t guessed, this romantic comedy is meant to be a variation on Charles Dickens’ classic “A Christmas Carol,” with a lesson aimed at commitment-phobes instead of greedy bastards.
 
The buzz: Originally intended as a starring vehicle for Ben Affleck (before the failure of “Gigli” raised concerns about his viability as a romantic leading man), “Ghosts” now hits theaters starring Affleck’s wife, Garner, and the rather dubious McConaughey, who hasn’t made a really good movie since Bill Clinton was in the White House. The honor of directing the project goes to Mark Waters, whose work ranges from entertaining (“Mean Girls,” “Freaky Friday”) to insufferable (Reese Witherspoon’s bomb “Just Like Heaven” and the Freddie Prinze Jr. vehicle “Head Over Heels”).
 
The verdict: There’s a lot wrong with this movie, but it all boils down to a premise that’s rotten at the core. Expecting audiences to automatically root for Connor to end up with Jenny represents everything cynical and stupid about Hollywood romantic comedies. The guy’s a smug, shallow jackass. It would take a filmmaker with a stronger sense of character and story than the workmanlike Waters and an actor of greater skill than McConaughey to render Connor at all sympathetic. The repulsive romance is made all the more painful by Garner’s winning performance—equally adept at sharp punchlines and emotional honesty—which firmly establishes Jenny as a woman who deserves better. (In a perverse twist, the movie even offers her an ideal match in a charming doctor played by “Rescue Me” co-star Daniel Sunjata, before shoving her back over to Connor.) Why does Hollywood have such a knack for getting romantic comedies so wrong? Who knows, but they owe it to performers like Garner to find a way to do better.
 
Did you know? Waters is also a producer on this summer’s indie romantic comedy “(500) Days of Summer” starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel, which is exactly the kind of funny, fresh, appealing movie that “Ghosts” is not.

Add a comment