French Kiss review by Jackass Jon

Story Summary

French Kiss is a funny little story about Kate (Meg Ryan) and Charlie (Timothy Hutton). Kate and Charlie live together in Canada and plan to be married someday, have some children and live in the perfect little storybook house... Kate is a history teacher and Charlie is a young doctor. At some point in the past Charlie decides to attend several medical lectures in France with Kate at his side. What a perfect business vacation right? Wrong. The trip is doomed from the start. Kate has an incredible fear of flying so at the last minute she backs out and sends dear Charlie on his merry way to Paris all alone. Then one day Charlie calls Kate from Paris to give her some terrible news, he's fallen in love with a young French woman. A goddess who he intends to marry immediately and there's nothing that he can do about it. He's simply in love with this woman and he's not coming home. Crushed with the news Kate abandons her fears (almost) and jumps on a plane headed for Paris to get her man back and ends up meeting Luc Teyssier (Kevin Kline) who at first glance seems like the average French "gentleman". But at the second glance we realize Luc is pretty much a low life drunken thief who is acting like Kate's friend to fulfill his own personal goals (no he's not trying to bed her either). As Kate's progress in winning Charlie back slowly creeps forward Luc is unfortunately dragged along for the ride and eventually falls in love with Kate. He knows her heart belongs to another man so being the true gentleman that he is, he hides his feelings for Kate and continues to help her achieve her goal. Besides he doesn't really have much else to do right now so what the hell. Well not much else other than staying out of jail. You see, Jean-Paul (Jean Reno) a Police officer and old friend is hot on Luc's trail. It would seem that while Luc was in the good old United States he somehow came into the possession of a beautiful diamond necklace. A necklace Luc is planning to sell so he can fund his own wine vineyard. Oh ya, lets not forget about the American grape vine he smuggled into the country as well... I'm sure the local officials would like to get there hands on that too... Anyhow, once Luc has helped Kate win Charlie back they go their separate ways forever and everyone is happy! End of story. Just kidding, it's not really the end. The movie really ends with Kate dumping Charlie only to return home alone but before she can fly off into the sunset Luc saves the day, gets Kate for himself and they live happily ever after in a beautiful little villa set in the middle of their very own wine vineyard.

DVD features

Basically the only feature on this disc would be the movie itself. Sorry!

Analysis

I know I'm gonna get nailed by everyone when they see "French Kiss" but here it goes anyhow...

Yes, French Kiss is a chick flick. I'll admit that right away but to be honest the movie is actually pretty good. Meg Ryan really shines with her little innocent school girl personality and Kevin Kline does a damn good job acting like a Frenchmen. No, hold on, he does an excellent job. In fact, I think he makes the movie what it is with his performance. The scenery in most of the shots are filled with beautiful buildings and lush foreign country sides which set the mood for what could very well have been a serious movie. But that's where it gets better, the movie is anything but serious and I found myself snickering at just about every scene. The whole theme of the film is for Kate the teacher to get Charlie the doctor back but just about everything that can go wrong does. We're led to believe that Kate and Luc are for the most part normal people involved in a situation that could happen to anyone but in truth they both have lives that are like wild roller coaster rides and somehow each of their goofy mishaps end up directly effecting the other person. It's just funny and the circumstances complement the movie very well. And I guess to keep with the theme of the "standard" chick flick, it all works out in the end so the "good guys" live happily ever after.

Final Thoughts

The movie doesn't have any ground breaking achievements or special DVD features but it is funny (and romantic) and I think its worth the rental at least once. Besides my wife likes it so what the heck... And just to keep things on the manly side, you really do have to see Juliette (Susan Anbeh). She's the goddess Charlie leaves Kate for. Wow!




7 out of 10 Jackasses
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