The Writer's Poke

Ben Stiller makes a very believable 16-year-old nerd. Cameron Diaz, too, can pass as the pretty popular high school girl. I found that I really liked the opening set-up more than most of what followed. Sometimes I find myself writing a different movie than the one written. It's a bad habit, I guess, but that opening segment was so good, I just found myself a little disappointed when it then jumped ahead 13 years to the present. The movie as written: Ted (Stiller) is a nerd, but for whatever reason, the pretty girl, Mary (Diaz), likes him. She is the one who actually invites him to Prom. Stiller's smile, mouthful of braces, is so sweet. He looks like Charlie Brown got asked to the Prom by the Little Redheaded girl. Unfortunately, they never make it to Prom. A ridiculous series of events in the bathroom lands Ted in the hospital, and Mary moves away. That's odd. As nice and as considerate as Mary is, she doesn't visit Ted in the hospital, and she never contacts him again....

Lisa Loeb's "Stay" was a very cool song to me when this movie originally came out, and I graduated college in 1994. Even so, I never saw this movie.  I'm sure the fact that this is a "romance" film, and that the romance genre has never been at the top of my favorites, is one main reason... It would take 32 years and an interest in Ethan Hawke films for me to finally see this one.  The movie does play the romance angle hard. In a normal romance, the two characters meant for each other can't just easily find their way to one another, but in this movie, the separation is teased a few times, and you start to wonder, Will they ever get together, or will "reality bite"? It's cute that the "Reality Bites" title is captured in the film, as part of the "In Your Face" program made out of Lelaina's (Wyonda Ryder) home movie camera documentary. In the end, almost everyone in the film actually "gets" something. Maybe it...