Directed by: Tom Vaughan
Written by:Dana Fox
Starring: Cameron Diaz, Ashton Kutcher, Rob Corddry, Lake Bell, Treat Williams, Queen Latifah
Released: May 8, 2008
Grade: C

Jack Fuller (Kutcher) is a womanising slob who can’t hold down a job.  Joy McNally (Diaz) is a superficial control-freak who has been dumped by her fiancé.  They don’t know each other but both are in Las Vegas on a whirlwind holiday looking to escape their troubles.

They will meet in bizarre circumstances.  I won’t say how because it’s too hard to explain and quite frankly, I couldn’t be bothered.  What ends up happening is the two go on an all-night alcohol fuelled bender.  When Joy wakes up the next morning, she is horrified to find a wedding ring on her finger.  That’s right – in all the carnage from the night before, this drunken duo somehow found the time to get married in a Vegas chapel.  Oops.

Over breakfast the next morning, Jack and Joy realise that it was all a terrible mistake.  They have nothing in common and after a few feisty arguments, they agree to get a quick annulment.  That all changes when Jack slips a coin into a poker machine and wins a $3,000,000 jackpot.  Joy thinks she should be entitled to half because it was her coin and because she’s married to Jack.

They take it to the courts and in a Judge Judy like decision, the judge sentences them to “six months hard marriage”.  He is tired of young people wanting quick divorces and he plans on making an example of them.  He freezes the $3 million and says they won’t see a dime unless they try to make their marriage work.  He also states that they must see a marriage counsellor once a week.

Look, what can I say?  I hated this film.  The storyline is ludicrous.  I have nothing against silly comedies but they still have to have an element of realism.  Jack and Joy do some cruel things to each other and we are expected to laugh.  Then in the later stages of the film, they start realising the errors of their ways and we are expected to feel sympathetic and happy for them.  Give me a break!

Jack and Joy are self-centred phonies.  I can’t think of anyone who would want to be friends with them in real life.  They are horrible people and Cameron Diaz and Ashton Kutcher only make them more dislikeable with their overacting.  The fact that Jack and Joy start falling for each other once they get to know each other makes very little sense to me.  Don’t fret if you think I’ve just given away the ending.  It’s blatantly obvious from the very start and it’s given away in the film’s trailer.

I saw this film at an advance screening and I overheard positive comments from some of the patrons on leaving the cinema.  I am prepared to acknowledge that there are moviegoers out there who will like this film.  They will see it as a fun and relaxed 90 minutes.  I saw it as an insulting waste of 90 minutes.  To each their own.