Rachel Getting Married -- in Real Time

A few random things about Rachel Getting Married, which my bf insisted we watch last night (or was I the insister? I don't remember and it couldn't possibly matter anyway):

1. I am a big fan of film-- particularly acting and writing. I love a great screenplay and a revolutionary acting performance. And I had heard such good things about Anne Hathaway's performance. After tolerating her in Devil Wears Prada (the movie of the new millennium) I was excited to see her in something more challenging and less cutesy.

2. Call me a snob, but when Rotten Tomatoes' Top Critics gives a movie a 94% rating, I'm going to expect it to be good.

3. I did, in fact, expect RGM to be good.

Now.

4. The film started off well enough. Anne Hathaway is a recovering drug addict-slash-other things on her way home from rehab to go to her yuppie sister's wedding. There was plot point about a clandestine lesbian relationship that could rear its head at some point (although I would later find that it went nowhere). And there was a "car ride home" scene with that hand held camera/gritty realism thing that I like so much. So far so good.

5. But this movie drug on forever. Scenes stretched to an interminable length. I didn't need to see forty minutes of lame speeches at the rehearsal dinner leading up to the sublimely uncomfortable speech that Hathaway gives. (It's really fantastic). This aspect of RGM reminded me of the film Day Night Day Night, which was about a girl who was going to be a suicide bomber in NYC. Every scene stretched out forever, and while it drove me crazy -- all tension, no release -- at least it made sense. The girl was going to kill herself and dozens of people in a flash of fire. Everything she did that day was "important." Not so with RGM. The film could have been thirty minutes shorter, or we could have added a lot of character development, like with the mother. (Hello?)

6. Anne Hathaway really is an amazing actress. I thought she was great in Brokeback, so-so in Prada, and I refuse to sit through the entirety of the Princess Diaries. I'm sure there are other things but I dont know them. But this is far and away her best performance that I've seen. She's got that intensely smart/99% crazy vibe that's really compelling to watch. And let me cite the rehearsal dinner speech again, as well as her support group confession. Wow.

7. There is a lot to say for RGM, such as how natural it seemed, definitely a testament to the great ensemble cast. But honestly, I was mostly bored. There is some good stuff in here, but you have to work too hard to find it.

8. I want a burrito.