Definitely, Maybe? Probably Not

Ah, Definitely, Maybe. I’ll keep this spoiler-free. I so badly wanted to like this movie. The trailer looked so good, and it stars so many people I love. Ryan Reynolds, Isla Fisher, Rachel Weisz…I think that’s it. The others I don’t really care for. Let’s plot it out. This movie is like a romantic comedy mystery. A father (Reynolds) is telling the story of how he met his wife to their daughter (Abigail Breslin) with fake names so she can guess who her mother is. Sounds like a good idea right? And it kinda is, but it’s poorly executed here. Ryan Reynolds, although very charming usually, is really kinda bland here. He’s playing someone who is working in politics-which I find pretty boring. Especially here, the story is told starting in 1992, so we get politics from back then. One of my issues with movies/stories in the past twenty years or so, is you’ll always get a dumb joke, one that a character will say something innocent enough, but because we know how that history worked out, we know to laugh now, wink wink. Ugh. Will leaves his college sweetheart behind in Wisconsin to pursue his dream of working for the Clinton administration (in New York) in some capacity, telling her they’ll still be together. Of course, a few weeks in (I think, I can’t really tell how time flows in this movie) they break up, and he moves on to date other women. The movie then goes on to describe his other girlfriends, with a lot more detail than I think I’d be telling my daughter. In any story I tell, I don’t think I’m describing stuff as much as he clearly is, but more on that later. I found this movie pretty boring. You’d think it wouldn’t be, with all the star power and things that are going on, but it moves very slowly, and sadly, I couldn’t stay focused. The loyalties between the women shift suddenly, I found a lot of stuff in the movie unnecessary, and I kept thinking of questions during the movie. Why did his daughter not already know the details of how they met? And the thing that helps the daughter find out who her mother is is such a detailed thing, and why was he detailing the story this much? Nobody tells a story, describing every little thing that happened then, where hands were, etc. Why don’t any of these people dress like its 1992? And when the end of the movie comes, I just didn’t care anymore who the mom was. (Although, I found it pretty easy to deduce who the mother was, maybe you might be able to also.) My favorite person in this is Isla Fisher, who I find adorable. Her acting is really good, and she fleshes her character out, whereas the other girls are happy with their one-note performances. She was my one bright spot in the movie. So, essentially, the movie isn’t all that good, despite a few strong performances. (Sorry, Ryan, this does not include you) It’s slow, and sort of boring in bits, and, although it’s a romantic comedy, it didn’t give me that warm fuzzy feeling at the end of the movie, just a feeling of sadness for the 2 hours I just wasted here. I’d give this a thumbs down, and say definitely, not maybe, go see a different movie.