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“The Dilemma” proves once again that it takes more than a stellar cast to make a good movie.
Starring Vince Vaughn, Kevin James, Winona Ryder, Jennifer Connelly and Queen Latifah, this comedy is not full of laughs.
The movie is only partly fun. The first half-hour starts out moderately fun and enjoyable. However, humor becomes increasingly rare over the course of the film, as comedic scenes are heavily outweighed by a depressing plot.
Viewers should be ready for sudden flashbacks to high school, as “The Dilemma” may very well remind them of the worst days as a teenager.
Ronny (Vaughn) and Nick (James) are best friends and success-hopeful partners in an auto-design firm. When their big chance comes to launch a potentially huge project, life seems great for the two. Nick is even married to a caring and loving woman named Geneva (Ryder), while Ronny is setting up to ask the big question to his girlfriend Beth (Connelly).
But when Ronny catches his best friend’s wife kissing another man, everything turns upside down. As the story progresses, more secrets and lies are revealed.
Even teenage girls will not label this inevitably depressing story a comedy. While there are a few good moments, none of them are great. A lot of the movie is just high school drama in the lives of middle-aged men and women. The worst is that none of the sad parts get better. Ronny’s life is constantly ripped to shreds, and even the resolution at the end is somewhat empty. The director, Ron Howard, must have thought that the process of ruining a man’s life one bad mistake after another was funny, because that is the only joke being told in the last half of the movie.
Even the characterization is sloppy. Geneva’s character is the strangest. Viewers know that she cheats on her husband, but at times, the movie portrays her in such a way that the audience is expected to forgive her. At other times, she is insane, and in one particular scene in the movie, Geneva acts like a freaky and bizarre villain. The director flip-flops with her character as if he has no idea how to portray her, and it gets annoying.
Viewers will have a hard time with all the cheating and fighting going on between couples, especially since “The Dilemma” was advertised as a romantic comedy.
