Ladies, do you ever feel like your fantasy is out of-control? For a random, unspecific example, let’s take the case of stud muffin du jour, Peter Coleman (Ashton Kutcher). Start with the obvious: Peter is handsome, straight, single, and still relatively young. Because of course he is. He’s a nice guy. He’s a successful guy. He started his adult life as a failed writer (only because he was never encouraged, not because he lacks for talent, which, by the way, would have been a lot funnier), so, like most failed writers, he morphed into an ultra successful independent consultant. He’s the kind of guy successful enough to drop everything for a week -no questions asked- just to fly across the country to take care of your kid. The kid that is in no way related to him.
What are Peter’s weaknesses, cuz he’s gotta have some, right? Single, handsome, nice, and early 40s doesn’t add up. Well … he’s a bit of a payah. Except he isn’t. The screenplay makes it clear that while he is capable of attracting supermodels and has done so on several occasions, he is monogamous to a fault when prompted. How about the fact that Peter has a drinking problem? Except that he doesn’t. He used to have a problem; now he doesn’t drink. Ever. Oh, here it is: his apartment is completely devoid of warmth or personality. Because of course it is; it’s waiting for HER.
You see, Peter has been holding a torch for Debbie Dunn (Reese Witherspoon) … for twenty years. Awwww. He was OK with her marriage to another man. He was OK with her mothering a non-Peter child and he’s been Debbie best friend for years. Awwwww.
You see this is a fantasy, right? This “perfect” guy has been holding out for, let’s face it, YOU, for twenty years, never really living his own life and being perfectly content to let YOU live however YOU wanted to in the interim. He’s like your own personal defibrillator – YOU store him in closet where he collects dust and remains forgotten until the exact time YOU need him, and he’s right there, all charged up and ready to jump start YOU back to life.
Would you say this fantasy has gotten out of hand, maybe?
Peter and Debbie met in 2003 following a night of poker ‘n’ sex, which –to be fair- sounds much more like a male fantasy. Maybe writer/director Aline Brosh McKenna was trying to even it out a little. Might have to try a little harder, Ms. McKenna. Twenty years later, Peter owns a gorgeous high-rise apartment and a small-but-successful consulting business in NYC. Debbie, now a divorced helicopter parent to a middle-school son, lives in Los Angeles where nothing about her life seems terribly stressful, but that doesn’t stop stress from happening anyway.
Debbie has to go to New York City for a class. But that leaves son Jack (Wesley Kimmel) alone, which can’t be. So Peter drops everything to switch places with Debbie for a week. Awwwww, isn’t that sweet? The set-up really makes you want to bang your head against the wall. You have a contact so independently wealthy and kind that he will drop everything and give you his condo for a week just to sit for your child with absolutely no ulterior motive whatsoever. That’s Nana behavior, and not terribly realistic at that.
I think my favorite part of the film was not the relationship between Peter and Debbie, but the fact that while each was removed from their natural habitat, they essentially exchanged friends as well. Debbie acquired Minka (Zoë Chao), who had dropped by to sleep with Peter and suddenly acquired
a new BFF while Peter rested on Alicia (Tig Notaro), who normally would have played nice with Debbie. I found this part equally unbelievable, but easier to stomach.
Romance is all about he leads, of course. The secret is finding people we want to fall in love. It’s hard to beat Reese Witherspoon or Ashton Kutcher as people you want to see fall in love. But that doesn’t really happen here, because the two are only in the same shot for about thirty seconds of a two-hour movie.
Your Place or Mine is cute, but too ridiculously far-fetched to take seriously on any level … even for a romcom. Which means we’re left with the romance to make this fantasy work. Well … what romance? The romantic leads are 3,000 miles from each other for 98% of film. And their conversations rarely involve more than “How is Jack doing?” It is only the likability of the leads that keeps this from being a “you’ve got to be kidding me” situation.
It’s the romance of Debbie and Peter
Parted by about five million meters
It took a whole score
Of years and some more
But, finally, he got the courage to tweet her
Rated PG-13, 109 Minutes
Director: Aline Brosh McKenna
Writer: Aline Brosh McKenna
Genre: Pretty people gon’ hook up?
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Single mothers
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Realists
