JUST FRIENDS

US, 2005, 95 minutes, Colour.
Ryan Reynolds, Amy Smart, Anna Faris, Julie Hagarty, Christopher Marquette, Stephen Root, Chris Klein.
Directed by Roger Kumble.

Director Roger Kumble made the quite clever college adaptation of Dangerous Liaisons with Reese Witherspoon, Ryan Philippe and Sarah Michelle Gellar, Cruel Intentions. He also made a lower-budget spin-off, Cruel Intentions 2. He also made the rather crass sex comedy The Sweetest Thing, with Cameron Diaz.

Just Friends is not going to go down as an important addition to his CV. On the other hand, it sets out to be an entertainingly obvious comedy for the cinema complex, and it achieves this goal quite well.

Ryan Reynolds is a personable actor who does not seem to mind sending himself up and literally falling on his face in farcical slapstick. He was the crude Van Wilder: Party Liaison and in Blade: Trinity. Here he is the fat teenager, Christ Bender, the butt of high school jokes and pranks whose best friend is Jamie (Amy Smart) who sees him only as a friend when he wants more.

Ten years later, he reappears fit and well-built, working for a record company and having to squire an impossibly silly and self-centred singing star (Anna Faris, who also does not seem to mind sending herself up as well as she did in Lost in Translation and she stars in the Scary Movies series). Will he win over Jamie? Could she love him? And what about Dusty (Chris Klein better and more convincing than usual), the high school nerd who now seems the town’s Mr Perfect?

Chris spends most of the film being self-absorbed and obnoxious, so much so that you wonder whether he will win over Jamie. And Mr Perfect Dusty seems to good to be true. It won’t spoil anything to suggest that the film has a happy ending. The cast is cheerful. There are some jokes and pratfalls and enough to be undemandingly entertaining.

1.An entertaining teen, early adult comedy? In comparison with the many made at the time? Humour, romance? Spoof?

2.New Jersey in the 1990s? The small town, the high school? The homes? The detail of life there? The contrast with Los Angeles, the parties, the glamour, showbiz? The contrast with New Jersey 2005 – although much the same as ten years earlier? The musical score, the range of songs?

3.The title, the focus on the relationship between Chris and Jamie? Jamie seeing Chris as a friend? His being in love with her? Trying to prove his love?

4.The portrait of Chris and Ryan Reynolds’ comic style? Overweight? His behaviour, ridiculed at school, writing the note in the yearbook? The party, his note being read out, young people’s reaction? The various comic farcical elements with his size? The hockey session?

5.Jamie, a nice girl, her friendship with Chris?

6.Ten years later, Chris, normal size? His lifestyle, his relationship with women? The parties? The record company, the boss? His job with Samantha James? The threats about losing his job?

7.Samantha, her pretentiousness, the dumb blonde? Her reaction to Chris? Demanding to go to Paris? The microwave, the foil and the fire in the plane? The diversion to New Jersey? Samantha and Chris’s brother, his infatuation? Her behaviour in New Jersey, ill at ease? Coming on to Chris? Jealousy of Jamie? Her being in Chris’s house in Los Angeles? His getting rid of her? Anna Faris and her spoofing this kind of starlet?

8.Chris, back in New Jersey? His relationship with his parents? His younger brother? Scenes at home? His meeting Jamie? His dating her, but his pretending to be cool? His second date? The ice-skating, the accident, his going to hospital? His getting out of hospital, his competing with Dusty? The bedroom scene with Jamie? His failure to make an approach?

9.Jamie, ten years later, attractive, in the same town, her work? Lifestyle? Her response to Chris? Liking him – falling in love? His nonchalance?

10.Dusty, the background of the past, at the hospital?

11.Dusty and his two-timing Jamie? The clash with Chris?

12.Chris, the return to Los Angeles, the effect of seeing Jamie again, Samantha present, his getting rid of her? His return to New Jersey?

13.The happy ending, the kiss?

14.A blend of the teenage romance with slapstick comedy?