FILM
THURSDAY,APRIL3,2003
Paltrow comedy not worth the 'View'
REVIEW
Gwyneth Paltrow as a flight attendant might be a good way to jump-start the lagging airline industry, but as the premise for a movie it feels a bit trite. Give me the Gwyneth of Shakespeare in Love and The Talented Mr. Ripley and leave the extended country-music videos posing as movies where they belong: with Reese Witherspoon.
Stephen Shupe
sshupe@kansan.com
In A View from the Top, the new American-as-apple-pie comedy from Brazilian director Bruno Barreto, Paltrow plays Donna Jensen, a Silver Springs, Nev., native who dreams of leaving her trailerpark past behind.
At the local bargain-basement commuting company, Donna hooks up with Sherry (Kelly Preston) and Christine (Christina Applegate), two other "unfortunate" souls blessed with extravagantly beautiful good looks. Soon, the trio signs up for the Royalty Airlines flight attendant program so they can fly the friendly skies far away from home.
An internal monologue is heard over much of the film, and the appealingly simplistic narration such as "Everybody has to start somewhere," lulls us into submission. Barreto's easy-listening-classics soundtrack contributes heavily to what is initially a spry and bubbly tone that begins to fade as Donna leaves Silver Springs and ventures out into the big bad world.
In A View from the Top, Gwyneth Paltrow plays a Silver Springs, Nev., native who dreams of leaving her trailer park past behind.
A View from the Top represents situational comedy at a lazy low. Donna's ups and downs veer in no particular direction before the film wraps up with the subtly offensive message that women should learn their place and stay close to home. Her brief stint in Paris suddenly transforms her look into that of a fashion model with paparazzi pretensions. Even Paltrow's
Dixie Chicks accent vanishes during the final stretch. Light comedy doesn't excuse such inconsistencies.
But if there's a comedic go-to man working in films today, it's Mike Myers, who shows up as the flight-attendant guru John Whitney. Using Whitney's lazy eyesight like a flashlight searching for comedy gold, Myers fattens up every scene he'sin, conjuring great material seemingly out of thin air. Whitney's sudden outbursts often recall the glorious days when Myers had trouble CONTROLLING THE VOLUME OF HIS VOICE on Saturday Night Live.
The presence of Candice Bergen (Miss Congeniality), as a novelist and mentor to Donna, only heightens the feeling that A View from the Top was tailor-made for someone like Sandra Bullock and that Paltrow is out of her element. She gets to act opposite one serious actor in the film, Mark Ruffalo (from one of the best films of recent years, Kenneth Lonergan's You Can Count on Me), and you can almost picture her sighing after a scene between them has been completed, realizing she'll have nothing to do in the next.
VIEW FROM THE TOP ... C+
Comedies are critic-proof, and anyone
Starring: Gwyneth Paltrow, Kelly Preston and Mike Myers.
Rated PG-13 for language and sexuality.
Playing at South Wind 12 Theatres, 3433 Iowa St.
who chooses to buy a ticket for this sort of movie is bound to get what they paid for. But it's important to consider what might have been, what improvements might have been made.
I suggest Paltrow consider a new career path, one with more ambition and fewer transparencies when it comes to slumming for the public's affection. In A View from the Top, Paltrow sends the same kind of mixed message.
Note: If you go see the film at South Wind 12, be warned that the print is very badly scratched. This means vertical lines will appear sporadically on the screen throughout the showing. This makes A View from the Top especially difficult to sit through and not just because it's a lame movie.
Shupe is an Augusta graduate student in journalism