Isn’t It Romantic

Natalie (Rebel Wilson) is told by her mother at a young, impressionable age to stop watching rom/coms cause life’s not a fantasy and especially not for girl’s that look like her. From that point on, Natalie’s approach to life and how people see her became pragmatic and limited. Until she’s knocked unconscious during an attempted mugging, where she wakes up and and finds herself trapped in the stereotypical romantic comedies that she came to despise.

As someone who reveres a good rom/com (although, I think someone should have taken them and soap operas away from me as a kid for my mental health) I was looking forward to seeing a parody/satire on the genre. Unfortunately, it’s just too heavy handed. The whole top of the movie overly explains the tropes found in most romantic comedies and then once Wilson’s character gets hits on the head (as in Amy Schumer’s “I Feel Pretty” and Taraji P. Henson’s “What Men Want”) they go and act out all the tropes previously discussed, in a very on the nose, not particularly creative or funny manner. The best scene is the one where she wakes up and Hemsworth’s character is coming out of the shower and she realizes because it’s a PG-13 version of the movie in which she’s trapped, no actual “action” happened the night before, so she keeps trying to get herself some Liam, but this scene was shown so many times in the trailers, it doesn’t hit you like it should during the movie.

Karaoke is a staple of the rom/com genre and I will say “Isn’t It Romantic” doesn’t disappoint in their version of a lively, singing and dancing extravaganza, set to Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody”; but then again, it’s kinda hard to mess up a Karaoke bar number.

Director: Todd Strauss-Schulson
Cast: Rebel Wilson, Liam Hemsworth, Adam DeVine, Priyanka Chopra

Tinsel & Tine the Large Association of Movie Blogs (aka the LAMb) rating: 2 outta 5