No Strings Attached Released 25 February 2011 Director Ivan Reitman Starring Natalie Portman, Ashton Kutcher, Kevin Kline, Cary Elwes, Greta Gerwig Writer(s) Elizabeth Meriwether Producer(s) Jeffrey Clifford, Joe Medjuck, Ivan Reitman Origin United States Running Time 108 minutes Genre Romantic comedy Rating 15A

5

No laughs attached.

What do you do with a problem like Ashton Kutcher? Without resorting to automatic weaponry!

He made his breakthrough as a mildly amusing presence on a mildly amusing sitcom That ‘70s Show. But he really only became widely known to the public when he hooked up with an older woman in Demi Moore. As a good-looking celebrity toy boy, Hollywood studios decided he would be a perfect choice to mould into a movie star. Ten years and a load of awful, mostly unsuccessful films later, they’re still trying.

Their latest attempt sees Kutcher play Adam, a lowly assistant on a High School Musical type show. He is devastated when his girlfriend leaves him for his Dad (Kevin Kline), a famous TV star. On a drunken bender, he decides to ring the number of every girl in his phone in order to persuade one of them to have sex with him. He wakes up the next day in the apartment of Emma (Natalie Portman), an old friend. Emma is a gorgeous doctor with a phobia towards relationships. Though Adam is keen on her, she’s not about to commit. So, instead they decide to become “friends with benefits”, there to satisfy each other’s sexual needs but with no emotional baggage.

So can they make this arrangement work, without them falling in love? Well, of course they won’t! This is a Hollywood rom-com after all, so you’re not going to escape from the standard happy-ever-after ending. Written by a female screenwriter Elizabeth Meriwether, you might hope for a fresh perspective here but it’s just the same old stuff we’ve seen for years. Ivan Reitman, one of the top comedy directors of the ‘80s, brings nothing to the project other than the incredulity of a pervy old man that all these pretty youngsters are having random sex with each other. The actual sex scenes are vaguely nauseating and curiously sexless.

So in an unsexy ‘Sex Comedy’ are there at least a few laughs? Sadly, no, as the script is completely laugh-free, full of wooden dialogue, unconvincing characters and contrived situations. The performances of the leads don’t help much either. Kutcher actually looks the most at ease, as this quality of film is his natural level. However Portman looks uncomfortable throughout, not being helped by a character that veers wildly between ice queen to crazy chick and back again. After her amazing turn in Black Swan, which will surely earn her a best actress Oscar, perhaps she will now feel able to turn down this type of role in the future. She’s way too good for this garbage.

The supporting cast is mainly just annoying, with the exception of Greta Gerwig (Greenberg) who, in her all too brief scenes, at least suggests a somewhat interesting character. Kline just lazily coasts along and for some bizarre reason, a near unrecognisable Cary Elwes turns up for a few scenes in a nothing role that could have been played by an extra.

Husbands and boyfriends everywhere should be on high alert. If your wife/girlfriend tries to drag you to this bland, cynical muck, RUN FOR THE HILLS!!!!

- Jim O’Connor