In an instantly infamous interview last week, NYT film critic Manohla Dargis excoriated Hollywood for its affronts to women both on-screen and in the audience -- particularly in the realm of romantic comedy. "One, the people making them have no f*cking taste," Dargis said. "Two, they're morons, three they're insulting panderers who think they're making movies for the great unwashed and that's what they want." With that in mind, who's ready for the first trailer for The Bounty Hunter, featuring Jennifer Aniston ensnared by her title-character ex, thrown in a car trunk, and handcuffed to a bed, all to a jaunty pop soundtrack in about 30 seconds flat?
Come on, don't make me ask again. I said: Who's up for a trailer comprising all the basic plot points of the great bounty-hunter/odd-couple comedy Midnight Run, watering them down with a few smirking Gerard Butler one-liners and hysterical, short-skirted Aniston flourishes, trapping them in a vague New York/New Jersey organized-crime box and tying the whole thing together with a bow tagged, "From the director of Hitch"? How about if Sony tossed in some gunplay and a few more bondage teases? The Atlantic City skyline? Butler leaping on top of an escaping Aniston by the side of the Jersey Turnpike? Anyone?
Fine. To the extent that I'm also annoyed, I can't really tell what it's about, either -- why exactly Aniston's character is in trouble, why Butler of all people is the one charged with bringing her in, who's out to get them (corrupt cops? gangsters?), or if any of it matters outside the semi-tense, sort-of-sexualized dynamic choking under those glossy layers of The Big Studio Sell. Maybe this is a classic, but I'll ask again: From these 143 seconds, who wants to see The Bounty Hunter? Or who just wants to read Dargis's imminent review?
VERDICT: So, so not sold.