Main cast: Sandra Bullock (Lucy Kelson), Hugh Grant (George Wade), David Haig (Howard Wade), Alicia Witt (June Carter), Dana Ivey (Ruth Kelson), Robert Klein (Larry Kelson), Heather Burns (Meryl Brooks), and Dorian Missick (Tony)
Director: Marc Lawrence
Marc Lawrence is an idiot.
He wrote and directed this movie, so all the blame is on him. He’s an idiot.
Just when Two Weeks Notice is going on so well, he has to introduce Alicia Witt in her thankless role as June Carter. That way, Marc Lawrence gets the chance to get off on writing about cat fighting females while insulting career women by assuming that if these women are beautiful, they sleep their way to the top.
Marc Lawrence is an idiot.
Two Weeks Notice is also a chance for Sandra Bullock and Hugh Grant to make some easy lunch money. Mr Grant is playing the same role that he played in About a Boy – the same hair, the same clothes, the same selfish and privileged playboy role. Ms Bullock plays the same old charming underdog heroine she has played since While You Were Sleeping. I mean, gee, even her character’s name is Lucy.
Lucy is a lawyer who wants to save old buildings. George is a millionaire who wants to tear them down. He hires her as his legal counsel in return for his sparing her beloved town hall, and soon he comes to rely on her pragmatic viewpoints so much that he cannot make a decision without her. Finally, when he calls her from her being a bridesmaid just to help him select a shirt, she’s had it. She gives him her two weeks notice.
At this point, I really like this movie. Mr Grant and Ms Bullock may be playing recycled roles, but they have some nice chemistry going. Then in comes June to seduce George, driving Lucy jealous. Instead of a nice relationship going between June and George, we have Lucy and June cat-fighting literally in the office.
And of course, in the end it doesn’t matter if he’s a jerk or an ass. As long as he loves her, all’s forgiven.
Two Weeks Notice is an insincere, formulaic, and dull movie that manages to insult me as much as it bores me. Marc Lawrence’s an idiot that way. He takes a decent romantic comedy premise and turns it into a turd pile just to massage his tumescent ego. Let’s run that idiot out of Hollywood and leave directing and scriptwriting to people who have more than half an ounce of brain, how’s that?
