Starring: Hilary Swank, Gerard Butler, Lisa Kudrow, Gina Gershon, James Marsters, Kathy Bates, Harry Connick Jr., Jeffrey Dean Morgan

Directed by: Richard LaGravenese

Warner Brothers Pictures

The Official Site of P.S. I Love You

Discuss P.S. I Love You on the boards!

How do you cope with losing someone when they won’t go away? No, P.S. I Love You is not the story of a woman (Holly’s played by Hilary Swank) literally being haunted by the ghost other dead husband (Gerry played by Gerard Butler)(though that would have justified some of the huge comedy moments that just fell flat), she’s receiving a series of letters that her husband wrote before passing away from a brain tumor. Letters that make her smile, make her grow but also keep reminding her that she’s alone.

These notes offer words of encouragement for how to move on, how to find happiness, and how to enjoy life, always reassuring her in the postscript that he loves her. As whimsical and lighthearted as Gerry’s letters may be, the pause, and that P.S. that follows, will get you every time.

Credit to Butler whose sing-songy Irish accent and lust for life (as revealed in the extensive flashbacks sequences showing us how the two met and fell in love) comes oozing through the speakers in his voice over performance. Even though he’s dead after one scene Butler’s presence is constantly felt in this, his first real headlining gig. Sure he was the star of 300 but he was practically just abs and a helmet under all that stylized screaming. Besides, his headliner status becomes official with P.S. as he gets his name above the title for the first time and the opportunity to show off those abs to a completely different audience. With 300 and P.S. I Love You Butler has become an action star, a romantic lead, and a sexual icon for both sides of the fence. A perfect choice for really building a career and leaving some of those big budget misfires like Dracula 2000 and Tomb Raider 2: Cradle of Life in the past.

Even though his death and letters keep the movie rolling along, it’s Swank that really has to sell her story as the emotionally lost widow fulfilling the last requests of her one true love. Swank is fine in the role but, I take her more seriously when she’s being… well… more serious. I like her as the boxer and the scientist and the sexually confused lady, even as the grieving widow. I believe her as those things and enjoy the stories she tells as those characters, but when it comes time for the grieving to stop and the widow to experience life, Swank stumbles. With her best gal pals Lisa Kudrow and Gina Gershon in tow, the trio set off on one adventure after another getting into humorous situations that could only be described as “something my grandmother might find amusing�. But the audience I was with wasn’t falling for it at all. It’s here that Swank appeared unnatural and uncomfortable. Thank God she can sell the sad stuff.

If the movie will get you anywhere it’s there. In Holly and Gerry’s love story and her frustration reliving it. It’s not epic or monumental by any stretch of the imagination. Greater character’s have loved harder and lost more with better performances in finer movies, but P.S. relies on the hopeless romantic in all of us. And it’s that part of me that’s having trouble bad mouthing their story.

In the final act, P.S. surprised me by not falling for the typical rom-com clichés and taking advantage of a nice, realistic, bate and switch that had me walking out with a smile. It’s far from ground breaking but I was beyond appreciative that it was anything but obvious.

In fact I think that’s how you could describe the majority of the film. It won’t change your life, make you believe or even give you any real answers on how to deal with your own loss, but it also avoids the answers Hollywood has been regurgitating for years. I’m grateful for a movie that told me a story without using what we would normally expect as a crutch. Moving on isn’t always as easy as the movies make it out to be and I’m glad P.S. I Love You never pretends it is.

Rating: 5.5 out of 10 - I realize that the average JLCM reader doesn’t care about P.S. I Love You, but this is a little something for the ladies. Actually Yeo is none too happy I decided to do a comic and review about PS I Love You. I've endured a couple conversations of, "It costs money and no one cares!" but I thought of a good comic, finished it weeks ago and sometimes that's enough for me to want to press on. The good news is that I was able to catch the matinee for only 6 bucks. Love you honey.

As the sole romantic comedy to be released in the holiday frenzy, P.S. was able to do some modest business. You can't blame it for not being able to take down I Am Legend, The Chipmunks or National Treasure 2, but it held its own against the big budget Sweeny Todd and wonder boy Judd Apatow's latest offering, Walk Hard.

It just goes to show you that romance will always sell even in a sea of monsters, movie stars, and adorable critters. If I’m being honest though I would say this one is worth waiting for.

Yeo warned me about this movie. “Looks like a good TV movie, but it’s not worth paying to see.� I don’t mind that I put out a little money to see it now and not have to wait, but she was definitely right about one thing. P.S. I love you is totally one of those movies to get lost in on a lazy weekend afternoon. As background noise while you’re cleaning, working, scrap booking (I don’t know what kind of freaky stuff you’re into) or just to tired to move, P.S. will really shine. But to buy it on DVD…? It already got my 6 dollars, I’ll wait until TBS puts it into rotation.

Catch and Release - Halfway through P.S. I found myself not buying Swank during the flighty, girly moments of the film and let my mind wonder on whom might be a better fit. Jennifer Garner’s name popped right to the top of the list as someone that could handle the highs and lows of this sappy girl drama and then I realized… she’d all ready made that movie this year.

Last spring’s Catch and Release also features a woman coping with the unexpected loss of a partner but leaves out the flashbacked love story in favor of the dramatic discovery of some dirty little secrets. As Garner’s character is putting her fiancée’s affairs in order she discovers a second bank account and a child that he never told her about. Accepting death is hard enough on its own but something like that changes your perspective and brings up questions that need answers from someone that’s too dead to give them.

It was interesting how she confronted it and eventually moved on, eventually taking the movie through to an ending that strongly differed from P.S.’s. In the review I called P.S.’s ending “brave�, and what I admired them avoiding Catch embraces with wide open arms. In the same turn, Catch and Release’s secret past introduced some interesting problems that P.S. would never touch. It’s odd to admire one film for not doing what the other does and vice versa, but at the same time realize, if you were to combine the best parts of each, you’d get one heavy, boring mess. There’s a reason the romantic comedy formula works so well just the way it is.

If this joke seems familiar it’s because I’ve used that punch line before. Way back in last year’s Blood Diamond. The set ups were completely different but when I was writing the comic about the spirit of man watching over a beautiful woman, I thought to myself, “What would I want to say to her�. There you go.

Over Her Dead Body - It’s nice to see Paul Rudd return to his girly movie roots. People forget how dreamy he was back in 1995’s Clueless when he was hitting it big and apparently waiting for the rest of his friends to get just as famous. Now with Aptow on his comedy throne and the gang from The State swarming Hollywood like a hysterically talented and perverted overturned hive of bees I thought he was free and clear to be the dreamboat in funny movies. But to make it in today’s industry you need to play the game, and that means 17 episodes as Phoebe’s boyfriend on Friends and unforgiving romantic comedies like Over Her Dead Body featuring Eva Longoria as a ghost haunting the psychic trying to steal her former fiancée. That makes another 17 episodes of Friends sound great.

Ultimately the movie looks harmless, and I can’t blame Rudd for taking the movie. Who doesn’t love a good sci-fi love story?

On Monday night’s episode of the Triple Feature (The 1/07/08 episode) we revealed our Top 10 Movies of 2007. Gordon has his list posted up over at Multiplex, but if you want to hear mine and Tom’s – give the show a listen.

It was a lot of fun to take a look back at the year and see which movies really stood out. I’m really happy with what I ended up on and plan to go into it further with a special comic and short write up for each. In the mean time though – listen! And thanks for reading, more soon. Movies you’ll be interested in – I swear. Ok, you might not care about the next one, but the one after that… fo shizz.