The Sweetest Thing Synopsis: A girl finds she is forced to educate herself on the etiquette of wooing the opposite sex when she finally meets Mr. Right.
The Sweetest Thing introduces us to Christina Walters (Cameron Diaz), who has a reputation for being a player. She loves men but hates committing, and she spends her nights attending clubs with her best friends, Courtney and Jane. After Jane is dumped, Courtney and Christina take her out dancing, where Christina meets Peter (Thomas Jane), a man she gropes as he passes by in an effort to get him to notice Jane. Needless to say, the two don’t start out on the right foot, but after a bit of verbal banter, things progress fairly quickly into a flirtatious encounter.
When Peter’s drunk brother gets tossed out of the club, Peter invites Christina to join them at their hotel party. Intimidated by their instant connection, Christina ends up going home instead, and the next morning, she instantly regrets not following her heart.
By then, Peter had gone, and all Christina knew about him was that his brother was getting married in Somerset that day. Courtney convinces Christina to drive with her to Somerset, where they can crash the wedding and Christina can reconnect with Peter. What follows is a short road trip stifled by some insane and, oftentimes, gross misadventures.
“My body is a movie and your penis is the star!”– Jane
This was my first watch, but I could see where Bridesmaids might have taken some inspiration from this movie – women can be as funny, commitment-phobic, and raunchy as men are in these kinds of movies. The difference is that Bridesmaids had a really smart, funny script and enough depth that the characters never came across as one-note.
The same can’t really be said for The Sweetest Thing. This movie could have been an Adam Sandler vehicle if the main characters had been men. There were a lot of ridiculous shenanigans, a strange, out-of-place fashion montage, and a group sing-along to Aerosmith to help defuse potentially painful oral sex fiasco.
Cameron Diaz, Christina Applegate, and Selma Blair are talented and funny enough to keep the movie from being a complete disaster. Thomas Jane is an appealing leading man, but his character ends up coming across as a bit of a goober. Out of the entire cast, I enjoyed Jason Bateman as Peter’s brother, and I wish he’d had more onscreen time.
“Don’t go looking for Mr. Right. Look for Mr. Right Now.” – Christina
Overall, The Sweetest Thing felt very disjointed to me. Yes, it had its moments, but those brief moments of humor couldn’t carry the entire movie. This review took me a while to complete, mostly because I didn’t have much to say. I didn’t love it, but I didn’t hate it either. It was okay, though I feel like it could have been better.
Maybe instead of filling the movie with a fashion montage and a group sing-along in someone’s bedroom, they could have given us a bit more development between Peter and Christina so we could understand what they saw in each other. Please give us a little more rom in this com! Otherwise, The Sweetest Thing is a goofy movie with a lot of raunchy humor that doesn’t always land. In any case, watch it for Jason Bateman because he’s always a blast.
Watched: 01/30/2021
Notable Song: Strange Condition by Pete Yorn
