Watched this one recently for the first time: Michelle Pfeiffer, George Clooney, about twenty character actors. Plus Ann Veal from Arrested Development as the little girl.
Hilarious 90’s fashion. Clooney knee-deep in his ER bob-his-head-and-peek-up-at-you acting style. Absolutely nothing in the romantic plot that had been new in decades. A laughable ignorance of <a> reporting, <b> mayoral press conferences, or <c> working in the architectural industry.
Then it keeps going long after it should have ended, while you sit around waiting for them to kiss. Including about two minutes of talking after she had already given him permission to kiss her. Then after they kiss they’re distracted and Michelle Pfeiffer goes into the bathroom getting pretty and being clumsy while they play “One Fine Day” and he falls asleep. What a freakin’ mess.
All that I could get past. What I could not get past was the kitten. I started calling it Will The Kitten Survive!
You see, as they wander all over New York City, the little girl has a new kitten with her, which they use as a prop for every scene. The kitten is carted around like a football by the little girl all over the loud bustling steets of Manhattan, sometimes on a dead run while they chase down a Taxi / Ferry / etc. No leash, no nothing. Clooney walks around in the rain in the park in New York City clutching the collarless kitten idly to his chest and scratching it like someone who doesn’t own one. They sit on the stoop to Michelle Pfeiffer’s office building at one point and I swear it was just sitting there, not even being held on to. I was terrified that kitten was seconds away from heading into traffic.
At one point the kitten escapes, the little girl goes after it, and for me that was the climax of the movie. (Of course it wound up in a comfy cozy old-timey antiques shop owned by a kindly older lady and not, say, Koreatown).
Couldn’t they at least have thrown a leash on it? Or maybe found another way to have the girl run off at one point, since AFAICT that was the only reason for having the cat at all?
I can’t think of a movie I’ve seen that had such little regard for the welfare of an animal that wasn’t at all related to the plot. They should consider re-releasing it as a Thriller and putting that kitten on the box.
