Unforgettable

"When love ends, madness begins."

Filmology Rating: 1.25 out of 4

At times going into a film with the lowest of expectations can help a film, other times it does nothing to help your appreciation or lack thereof for the film.  I knew nothing about Unforgettable while walking in other than the poster.  I thought I would be in for a film like Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor or No Good Deed and that is basically what I ended up watching; a film well past its prime with some of the worst dialogue and direction that I have seen this year.

Julia, played by Rosario Dawson, has recently moved in with her soon to be husband David, played by Geoff Stults, but David’s ex-wife Tessa, played by Katherine Heigl, doesn’t believe she will be a good fit for David.  Tessa begins to obsess about how she can win David back and to make sure no woman will ever be able to be with him again.  

I’m a huge fan of thrillers, even pulpy ones like Basic Instinct and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, so this film could have been a film that I would recommend.  However, the biggest sin that this film has is a  lack of tension; as a thriller it should always have a good dramatic sense of it but when the focal point of the movie changes between characters you are never left wondering what is happening because the film wants to hold your hand and walk you through the entire film.  I was falling back into my seat trying my hardest to stay awake during this film.  Any film that attempts to put the audience to sleep is atrocious but it’s especially horrifying when that film is a thriller.   

The script for Unforgettable was written by Christina Hodson and David Johnson.  Hodson wrote the thriller Shut In last year which I thought was more of a comedy than thriller so I should have expected to have a distaste for this film from the start.  While Johnson has a more thrilling resume than Hodson, it still doesn’t offer much hope other than he wrote The Conjuring 2.  Basically the film was doomed from the start, yet Denise Di Novi, the director of the film, decided to go forth with the predictable and simplistic script.  Unforgettable was Novi’s feature film debut but she has produced some great films in the past like Crazy, Stupid, Love and Ed Wood but her direction lacks a sense of purpose and the action that is upcoming in the scene is always predictable because she wants to show it to you before it actually happens.  I normally don’t wish for a director to step away from the camera but this is a case where Novi clearly doesn’t have the talent to be behind one and she is better off making the phone calls and writing the checks.  

However the film is not entirely horrid, it does offer some glimmers of light with the performances given by Rosario Dawson and Katherine Heigl.  Dawson has proven many times that she is a great actress and has great screen presence in films like Trance and Rent but the script for this film doesn’t do her any favors and she is trying to make the best out of a terrible situation but there's only so much you can do when you are playing the helpless victim for most of the film.  As for Katherine Heigl, this is easily the best performance of her career thus far.  Normally she plays the romantic interest in romantic comedies like The Ugly Truth and Life as We Know It, and this film knows that she has that reputation and it wants to play on it.  People who know Heigl from those romantic comedies will be in shock to see how manipulative and evil she can be in this film and she does a good job at it.  Is she over the top at times? Of course. But when everything else in the film isn’t subtle you can go along with the performance.  

This film is terribly titled as it’s almost completely forgettable as you walk out of the theatre.  This film won’t appeal to those who like a good thriller nor will it appeal to those who like a good romantic drama.  The film just lingers wanting someone to remember it but this film will be lost to the void of time.   

Rating: Let It Burn

-Jonny G