Movie 9: The Proposal

Sandra Bullock plays a high powered executive in a publishing firm, a true bitch on wheels. Ryan Reynolds is her beleaguered assistant who works his ass off in the hopes of becoming an editor. Bullock’s character is Canadian, and she’s about to be deported as her Visa has just expired (how she got to be at the top in a publishing firm on a Visa I dunno). So to stay in the country and not lose her job she bullies Reynolds in to marrying her. To sell the story to an immigration official he takes her home for his gran’s 90th birthday. Hilarity doth ensue.

Kinda

Let me get this out of the way at the start. I am not a fan of Sandra Bullock. I’ve sort of liked her in a couple of movies, genuinely liked and was surprised by her in one (28 Days btw, shut up I liked it). But 90% of the time I think she’s a craptacular actress. She doesn’t come across as genuinely tough, doesn’t show any believable emotion for the majority of the time in her rom coms, and isn’t funny in the least. I will say that talent shines through in moments in pretty much everything she’s in, which makes it all the worse in my book. You can do it sometimes Sandra, do it ALL the time…

Ryan Reynolds on the other hand I pretty much always like. He hardly shines here, but he is good. And it’s all in little nuanced reactions and facial expressions. This guy CAN do funny, very well. And actual acting too. This is no doubt a bit of a pay check picture for him. I expected to say that he was the one good thing in this but that’s not quite true.

Betty White is the one other good thing (that’s not true either but it’s a nice segue. And she isn’t a good thing all the time but that’s more script than Betty). Pretty much since the time of the Golden Girls I’ve associated Betty White with my own Gran. She’s always playing these kinda ditzy sweet old lady type characters. Okay, so my Gran isn’t exactly like that but I always see a bit of her in White’s performances. Which means that she’s obviously going to resonate quite strongly with me. No exception here. And for your fun “aw, ain’t Betty White sweet” moment, she nearly turned the film down cause she didn’t want to be away from her dog for 10 weeks. Awwww, Granny….

CGI Alaska looks pretty too. And actual Boston / North Shore looks very pretty. The Proposal is perfect for you if you like pretty scenery, minor laughs, Betty White and absolutely no surprises. Because there are none at all. After you’ve seen a character for 3 seconds you know they’re whole arc. And the ending can be spotted from the trailers for other movies that go before the film. I literally saw two ways they COULD go. They do BOTH. Really no hurry to see this for anyone.

Next up: Quarantine