Something's Gotta Give

Do all men who eat well, love well and sex up the younger demographic have to suffer horribly for their crimes? Are heart attacks, deep regret and trans-Atlantic pilgrimages to repent the only course of action for their bad behaviour? Is it really so highly unusual for two consenting adults over 50 to hook up, or just for those who dwell inside of the general Los Angeles area? Nancy Meyers' highly moralistic middle-of-the-road screwball Something's Gotta Give tries to answer these questions and more. Structured as a female revenge fantasy, the film casts Jack Nicholson as Harry, an infamous hedonistic bachelor who bears a shocking to resemblance to, well, Jack Nicholson. Harry, we are told even before the credits roll, is a connoisseur of women but it is clear right from the start that he has sampled mostly from the early-bird special. When Harry has a mild coronary at the beach house of his current girl du jour, Marin (Amanda Peet), it is her over 50 mother, a buttoned-up divorcee playwright (Diane Keaton), who is forced to nurse him back to health. Trapped together, the two spend their time wildly debating the merits of their life choices. Enter laughter. Enter love. Enter four completely implausible endings. "I wanted this film to have the feel of those old-time romantic comedies," Meyers tells us on the commentary that accompanies the disc, but what she forgets is that those films had a major ace in the hole: comedic timing. Although she has some comic ringers as collateral, her film never really pays off, mostly because the script is teaming with pat generalisations and phoney one-offs. Keaton, in the role for which she won a Golden Globe, flips her hair and laughs uproariously at everything Nicholson says while he spends most of his time smiling lewdly or showing his ass for cheap effect. It's almost as if Meyers doesn't trust the very premise she's trying to sell to us: that people over 50 can be sexy. The relief, ironically, is Keanu Reeves, who turns in the most mature performance of the film. Extras include two commentary tracks, a deleted scene in which Nicholson sings karaoke and a "house tour/meet the crew" segment disguised as real-estate porn hosted by Amanda Peet. If you can sit through any of it without throwing up, hats off to you. (Columbia/Sony)