20 Dates Review
by Evan A. Reidell (ereidell AT mit DOT edu)November 26th, 1998
(Later on in this writing, I've done the very things I hate about most movie reviews: I merely give away all the good bits that I can remember, retell the plot points. Yet I really do like to read such spoiler'd reviews of movies myself, especially if I might never go see the movie. So, this "review" will be un-spoiled for a while, and then chock full of spoilers.)
Un-spoiled:
A filmmaker, decent looking fellow and charming though a bit of an insensitive jerk, tries to record twenty of his dates on film with his small film crew. This is no easy task, not at all. There is a lot of wit and comedy, some magic romance, and also some very uncomfortable situations. Watching "candid camera" footage of unsuspecting dates, real women getting their feelings hurt, turns the whole audience into uneasy co-conspirators.
Imagine if Man Bites Dog was _not_ a fictionalized comedy, but a real documentary of a charming serial killer doing actual murders. Somebody would surely get arrested. Such a film would never be accepted by the public, or seen, even.
It almost feels like this film, "20 DATES", won't make it to a wide release. Because they don't have permission from so many people for having secretly filmed them. Or because of all the queasy uneasiness, the social incorrectness, a happy-ending that feels a little unnatural... This is almost a kind of social snuff film. Many women will probably hate it. But it is also a VERY FUNNY MOVIE!!!
It is done in a documentary style that is 98% believable, as in "this really happened, this is how it happened on that day" (but at some points I feel he has taken some liberties with the "truth" --- as well he should have, it's his movie!!)...
It is very well edited. There is a lot of great comedy, and I recommend that people see it, because I want the world to be a place where a punk with a camera and an idea can just make a movie, god damnit, and have it get out there and be seen by people... (No-budget/shoestring-budget cinema, think of recent successful examples of El Mariachi, pi...)
So go see it, if you can!!
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(and why have I done this? Is this a review or a spoiler?)
(After seeing a film, I like to reread spoiler'd stuff like this, to remind myself of the events I saw ---
later on you can read these bits and relive the film...)
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Myles Graham Berkowitz made a movie!!! Hooray!!!
MPAA #36059
If you're a woman who ever thinks "Men are such jerks"
here's a film that can (reinforce/bolster) your opinion.
"Most contemporary love stories are about longing" says Robert McKee, screenplay-seminar (demigod/scoundrel) as he describes Sleepless in Seattle as a "boy meets girl", "boy meets girl", "boy meets girl" movie.
Myles: "You don't know what your type is, but you know that I'm not it?"
"Can I just take a look around your apartment?" he says,
three minutes after all the cameras and lights have already
raped the room...
Myles asks Stephanie if he can get a discount on some clothes. Over and over again?! It's getting late, says Stephanie. "Stephanie excused herself, and I never saw her again."
"Do you think that women find me offensive?" he asks a friend, who candidly responds "I honestly wouldn't narrow it to a gender thing"...
The truth of having to worry about the finances of a date
when we know that our team has $56 (and no more room on the credit cards) and the "date" orders 3 pounds of $20-a-pound lobster...
What's it like to be single and dating in L.A.? "You're like a cinder in hell, there's flames and sparks all around you and nobody notices or cares, you're a tiny litle speck in a really really evil place"...
Scenes of the Sound man laughing!!!
He has a date with a vegetarian,
gets kicked out of all the restaurants because of the camera and lights, (almost the way David Letterman's cameramen were ungracefully shoved out of the G.E. building). She had a real rotten time...
Moments at which the Candid Camera is revealed to a woman with whom the date was going really well, who then feels betrayed and is very displeased... because he's hurting the feelings of a real human being,
it's like a social snuff film...
"You think that's funny?" says one date, and maybe she's right... do we think it's funny???? we're all guilty accomplices as we watch this movie...
Lawyers get invoved several times as various women sue Miles.
"Now I was being sued..." he says, and we sure believe it!!
Some dangerous sexism:
"she seemed to get real friendly after some drinks"...
"Women come and go, but movies are around forever..."
Robert McKee, screenplay-seminar (ubermensch/sleazebag): "Men are interested in the physical, and women are interested in the fantasy, the phantom, or metaphysical... so the chance that true love can occur between two people searching for such wildly different things is slim to none".
Caren, a good-looking friend of Myles, goes on a date with a guy who makes some horrific blunders... "At least you're a woman, and not my ex-wife, that's a good start..." "We're also missing Friends and Seinfeld" he says...
A probably-arranged shot of M. Berkowitz's script sitting alone
and abandoned on a different shelf than all the other scripts
He bungee-jumps, terrified. "I hope you fuckin got that shot"
are his first words when he comes to rest.
Stalking Elisabeth in the mall with the camera.
Friend: He's an actor, a big star, you've ever seen him?
Elisabeth: No...
Myles: "Oh, you don't watch porno movies?" (good on-the-spot joke!)
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We never get to see ELIE,
but learn a lot about him from the secret audiotapings...
Elie is almost a caricature of a sleazy Hollywood producer...
but we know he's real. He has ponied up $60,000 to get this film made. (Thank you, Elie.) He sounds like he really wants to be a porn producer.
Elie:
"How can there be no sex in this movie? Tits and ass SELLS..."
"I want a fucking happy fucking ending..."
"... or you're gonna come up with some fucking piece of fucking crap, rated ___P fucking G___ ..."
Elie:
"maybe some bitch will freak out and take her bra off..."
"I want sex in this movie, or I swear to God, you're gonna wish you were living in Timbuktu cause if you're somewhere that I can find you, I'm gonna break both of your fucking legs..."
He seems to have access to a miniharem of models and bad actresses, Why am I envisioning Ivan Nagy (Heidi Fleiss: Hollywood Madam)
but seedy, less charming, and fatter...
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"Every date hates his guts??"
says his pregnant EX-WIFE with a giddy and gleeful smile on her face...
We learn more about Myles from his ex-wife, who is
all too happy to spill all the rotten beans she can come up with... "He needs to shut every door in the house when he goes to the bathroom..." "He tells me to "shh" during sex! Can you imagine that?"
He gets into a real loud fight with his ex-wife,
they are arguing over who left who first.
Later, he gets one of his dates to admit
that in her most recent relationship, "I was the one that left him" and like VH1 POP-UP videos, we see Myles thinking "Finally!"
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Myles and company partycrash a wedding, stalking pretty women with the camera. It's sort of amusing, but we know it's so wrong? "I'm a friend of the groom", he lies to one woman he has cornered. "Oh really, I'm the groom's sister, how come I don't know you?" she responds... "Would you go ever out on a date with me?" he asks. "Perhaps... cause you're a friend of my brother's..." she replies.
"She didn't work at six jobs,
she wasn't some kind of __IMMIGRANT__" Myles says uglily.
Scenes from:
Sleepless in Seattle
When Harry Met Sally
Singing In The Rain
Titanic
Myles with a kid, on the beach, trying to get the kid to say "Hi" to women passing by, creates some very amusing moments: The kid finally says "Hi!" --- to an old man jogging by!! or waits until women have already gone by to say "Hi!" (Empty threats to the kid we understand are phony and intended mainly to amuse.)
I get to thinking,
Gee, this guy is actually able to find twenty attractive women that are available and willing to go out on a date with him,
that right there is WONDERFUL!
A shot of our soundman Greg getting spanked in a fetish bar.
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(the real romance with Elisabeth)
He is "Wanting to record the precise moment when two real people were falling in love..." and he actually does get to do so!!
Myles: Am I better looking than him? [her other boyfriend] Elisabeth: That's not a fair question...
Myles: That means __I'm__ better looking!!!
Cute Stunt where he trips on the curb,
and then gets to hold Elisabeth's hand!!!
More comedy:
"Neither one of us wanted to be the one who let go first", and we see Myles trying to eat a muffin all the while not letting go of her hand...
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Myles needs more dates to get up to 20. A young intern suggests a friend of hers. "She's a total babe, lips, tits, everything, she looks just like Jessica Rabbit, just like Jessica Rabbit". (Elisabeth gets very uncomfortable and leaves the room). Turns out the girl that the intern is talking about is your average-looking twenty year old. "Did you ever see "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" Myles asks the intern. "Actually, No, I never saw it..."
Offbeat oddball moments:
Myles instructing a child to "Walk on the other side of the flag!!"
Interviewing a five-year-old kid ("Some Kid") eating ice cream...
"The kid was right. But what the hell does she know about
real life, anyway??"
French-bashing. "Everybody finds the French annoying"...
Feminist Ballerina who (supposedly?) stabs him in his hand with a fork. I say supposedly because it's possible that he just wrapped his hand in a fake bandage just to make the joke... and if she had stabbed him, surely they would have shown it??!!
Sound man shown eavesdropping on the shots...
it's always great to see the sound man laughing!!
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"It's very hard to keep dating when you have a girlfriend..."
He brings one woman back to his apartment to protect her from her abusive boyfriend. At this point, Elisabeth is his live-in girlfriend. "You didn't tell me you had a girlfriend!" says the date.
When he says "Elisabeth is just a friend" right in front of Elisabeth, she gets __nonemotionally upset/outraged/tearful__ and runs away...
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Perhaps the film makes its point --- dates are this horrible
uneasy social fumbling ordeal that rarely works out well...
the odds are 1 in 20, right!?!?!
Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer was fiction;
Man Bites Dog, fictionalized (and had the camera crew aspect)
but if we were watching an actual snuff film, could we feel good about it? How dare I compare murder to dating? Watch the movie, maybe you'll see the connection I did!
A very brave film to make... congrats!!!
Because of the nature of the film, I was expecting to see one last moment of "something" after all the credits have rolled --- cause it's that kind of movie. But such a moment never came.
Are Myles and Elisabeth still together, right now? (Nov 25 1998)
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
