Bachelorette: Story of (True) Friends

the Plot:
The film opens with Regan (Kirsten Dunst), a miserable careerist in her early thirties, having lunch with her longtime friend, Becky (Rebel Wilson), who reveals that she's getting married to her moneyed boyfriend, Dale (Hayes MacArthur).

Becky flashes her ring :)

Regan processing the fact

Although secretly jealous and embittered by the fact that her "fat friend" is now engaged, Regan notifies their two other friends, the sardonic coke-sniffing Gena (Lizzy Caplan) and the rowdy party girl Katie (Isla Fisher).

sharing the news, barely containing her true feelings

Gena flits from one bad into another

Becky works in retail, surviving with the help of her gay freelance stripper friend

Six months later, the women are preparing for Becky's impromptu bachelorette party that evening; Gena flies in to New York from Los Angeles, and the four meet at the hotel, when Katie announces that she has brought cocaine for all of them to do.

At the dinner party that night, Gena runs into her ex-boyfriend Clyde (Adam Scott), whom she sees flirting with Dale's younger sister, and Katie runs into Joe (Kyle Bornheimer), a former classmate and pot dealer. Trevor (James Marsden), the best man, gives a speech at the party, and Gena, high on cocaine, reveals in her toast that she first met Becky when she caught forcing herself to throw up in the high school bathrooms.

After the dinner, the women go to their suite, where Katie's gay co-worker arrives and does a striptease for the women, but Becky stops it after he jokingly calls her "Pigface", a cruel nickname of hers in high school. Becky leaves the bachelorette party, and Regan, Gena and Katie are left in the hotel room where they drink and continue to do cocaine.

Drunk and high, the three accidentally rip the dress, and Katie gets a nosebleed and stains it with her blood.

they try to get the hotel maid to fix it but was informed the tailor is off-duty

they bump into the guys going out for a stag party

Regan contacts the tailor who made the dress for Becky, who reluctantly agrees to open the store for them in the middle of the night.

 

After unsuccessfully searching the store for a dress that will fit Becky, and the one that is one size smaller for her is the one Regan always dreamed of having for her own wedding, Katie reveals that she can sew, which leads the women on a hunt for thread and a sewing machine.

Regan rather licks the pavement than letting Becky have that dress. So Gena asks her to do it so that they can settle the matter

Trevor text messages Regan asking the girls to stop by the strip club the men are at, which they agree to, in order to get Clyde's help with the dress (Clyde's mom used to sew their high school's play dresses).

yup. pretty sums up Katie all right

 There, Joe shares some pot with Katie in the gents whilst Regan chats up with Trevor, flirting.

Gena takes the dress into the strip club's bathroom where she attempts to clean it. There, she has a conversation with a stripper who begins using the dress as a towel and toilet paper, unbeknownst to her, and thus smearing semen and whatnots on it.

showing appreciation for the stripper's wise words

Regan, furious when she finds out, gets into an argument with Gena, who insists they confess everything to Becky, and it is revealed in the argument that Gena had an abortion once, with Regan driving her to the clinic when Clyde didn't show up. Gena leaves the club with Clyde and the dress.

And as they are having an argument in the Metro, Clyde blurts out that he didn't drive Gena to the clinic years ago because he was so sad that they had to abort the baby.

 

They arrive at Clyde's house and his mother agrees to help sew the dress, whilst insisting Gena to put some pants on. As the dress is getting fixed, Gena and Clyde get to talk and patch up somewhat.

Gena finds out that Clyde still keep a tab on her. in this pix, he's taking pictures of a Gena sad face pancake and tagging her on Facebook

Trevor asks Joe to take Katie home so that he can have Regan alone for the night, good to go mode ON, apparently

Meanwhile, Joe attempts to woo Katie, who is heavily intoxicated and high on cocaine, and Regan ends up having sex with Trevor in the hotel bathroom. Joe and Katie spend the night in the hotel swimming pool, where Katie reveals that she attempted suicide the year before whilst getting high.

i feel sorry for Katie... sobs

Becky calls and asks Regan to come to her room so they can talk; in their conversation, it is revealed that Regan is bulimic, and that Becky covered it for her in high school. Just as Regan begins to tell Becky about her dress, Becky's mother arrives, and they begin to prepare for the wedding.

Gena wakes up naked next to Clyde in the morning, rushing back to the hotel with the dress.

Gena is really serious about her war with pants. hahah

Back at the hotel, the party planner is unable to find the missing dress but Regan manages to divert their attention into focusing on Becky's hair and make-up instead.

freaking out

Gena asks a maid at the hotel to help her dry clean the dress before bringing it to Becky; meanwhile, Katie locks herself in the bathroom and overdoses on Xanax. While Regan forces Katie to vomit the pills, she ends up puking all over Regan's dress. Regan, in an attempt to buy time, convinces Becky to ride to the wedding in her pajamas and put on the dress when she arrives.

Becky, irate, screams at her mother and Regan in the taxi.

for once, Regan has nothing to say to calm Becky down

Gena arrives to the wedding with the dress, still stained with blood, yelling "I save the day!" They quickly get Becky to change.

At the moment when the wedding march sounds, Becky confides her insecurity, that people think she's too fat for Dale, which Regan retorts back with their longtime mantra "F@ck everyone!"

i love the way Dale looks at Becky, truly showing how he's feeling at the moment: the luckiest man in the world!

Becky ends up walking down the aisle while Regan and Gena sit on a bench and watch the ceremony, where they are joined by Katie, who arrives late.

if looks could kill

At the reception, Joe and Katie talk and kiss, Regan tries to sleep, and Clyde gives an obscene speech about him and Gena, ultimately confessing that he wants to spend his life with her. The film ends as the four women make up and dance together at the party.

the Review:
i was rather attracted to the underlying theme of the film, it's about friendship. friends you can always count on, someone to prop you up, shove their fingers down your throat, someone to pick you up and drive you to the abortion clinic, someone who would be your friend even when they are most jealous of you at that point and yet walk you through your wedding day.

a friend. in its truest sense.

Regan is a person, comparable to Hannibal Lecter. She's jaded, miserable and frustrated with her life, yet she helps Becky to plan her wedding for 6 months. on the eve of the wedding, it's only natural that she blows her steam, more so with Gena, the snarky and Becky the twat, the original B-faces Gang.

it is rather hurtful to think that in a 4-girls gang, yet there is a 3-person inner circle. Regan, Katie and Gena have one thing in common, they don't have physical issues that Becky is facing yet, believe it or not, each has their own problems, their own demons that they have to fix.

for instance, Regan hates her job where she attends to young kids having cancer. it is a noble job but as the kids undergo chemotheraphy which is hell, more so to the kids, her soul gets ate up bit by bit that she ends up hating what she has to endure to make the kids feel much better.

Gena, she couldn't work Clyde out of her system. the mere mention of Clyde's attending the wedding convinced her to come from Los Angeles. she's a mess, drifting from one night stand into another, in short, she's being a slut. but perhaps the abortion, Clyde's abandonment of her at that vulnerable time, being 15 years old at that point, makes her what she was..

Katie, a good soul but so messed up, she's not functioning. it saddens me when she confesses she was so high, she almost killed herself once. it's good that Joe's being a gentleman. that though i could hit his head for giving Katie's pot when she asked for it, i have to admit, he's basically a good person, redeeming himself by not getting it on with Katie when she's too inebriated to even know who he is.

i suppose, Becky is the luckiest person. she's a good friend, taking the flak for Regan by letting everyone think that it was her with the bulimia problem. no wonder she ends up with Dale, a true gentleman who's really into her.

Regan and Gena, they might fight with each other, but they are so close that mouthing off each other is so natural, it won't break their kinship.

i wonder how these people gonna end up in the future but as the movie ends, i realise, it's ok as long as you have your friends with you..

btw, that was gross of Clyde to describe his moment of clarity. nevertheless i do dig his relationship with Gena, they look sweet together! love Adam Scott in this one :)

The Notebook: what you want...

Trailer:


Plot:
At a modern-day nursing home, an elderly man named Duke (James Garner) begins to read a romantic story from his notebook to a fellow patient (Gena Rowlands).

The story he tells begins in 1940. In Seabrook Island, South Carolina, local country boy Noah Calhoun (Ryan Gosling) is smitten with seventeen-year-old heiress Allie Hamilton (Rachel McAdams) after seeing her at a carnival, and they share an idyllic summer love affair. Noah takes Allie to an abandoned house, which he explains that he intends to restore the house.  And Allie requests to have her own spot in the house, a room to paint, overlooking the lake. It was some sort of a reaffirmation that she intends to marry him.

Later that evening, she asks him to make love to her, but they are interrupted by Noah's friend Fin (Kevin Connolly) with the news that Allie's parents have the police out looking for her. When Allie and Noah return to her parents' mansion, they ban her from seeing Noah, whom they called "trash, trash, trash". Knowing that her parents do not approve of him, Noah leaves the house, much to Allie's frustration that her fiery temper gets to her head.



The two break up, in the fits of Allie's temper. The next morning, Allie's mother announces that the family is returning home to Charleston. Desperate, Allie searches for Noah at the lumberyard but he's not there. Fin instead asks her to leave Noah alone, that it's not going to work out. She asks him to tell Noah that she loves him and that she's sorry. She leaves by asking Fin to tell Noah to write to her.

For a year, Noah writes a letter to Allie each day. But the letters are intercepted by Allie's mother (Joan Allen), leaving Allie to feel that Noah has forgotten her.

Noah and Allie have no choice but to move on with their lives; Noah and Fin enlist to fight in World War II and Fin is killed in battle. Allie becomes a volunteer in a hospital for wounded soldiers, where she meets an officer named Lon Hammond, Jr. (James Marsden), a young lawyer who is handsome, sophisticated, charming and comes from old Southern money. The two eventually become engaged, to the delight of Allie's parents, but Allie sees Noah's face when Lon asks her to marry him.

When Noah returns home from the war, he discovers his father has sold their home so that Noah can buy the abandoned house, fulfilling his lifelong dream to buy it for the departed Allie, whom by now he hasn't seen for several years. While visiting Charleston, Noah witnesses Allie and Lon kissing at a restaurant; he convinces himself that if he restores the house, Allie will come back to him. Some says he works on the house like a madman, and when he completes it, he refuses to sell it, regardless of the price offered.

Later, during a bridal gown fitting, Allie is startled to read in the newspaper that Noah has restored the house that she faints there and then. Knowing that she has to see him, Allie visits Noah in Seabrook.

In the present, it is made clear that the elderly woman is in fact Allie, who is suffering from dementia and cannot remember any of the events being read to her. Duke, the man who is reading to her, is her husband, but Allie cannot recognize him.

Back in the forties, Allie and Noah renew their relationship by spending time together, as friends. Her feelings come back to her and she questions Noah for not writing to her before. When she knows the truth, and that Noah still has feelings for her, they make love at Noah's now-restored house. In the morning, Allie's mother appears on Noah's doorstep, warning Allie that Lon knows about Noah being her first love back in Seabrook and thus has decided to follow her there. Confused, Allie tells Noah that she's going back to talk to Lon, much to Noah's frustration that they fight.





As Allie reads Noah's letters, she knows she has to confess to Lon about Noah and her feelings. He is upset but says that he still loves her. Allie tells him she knows she should be with him, but she remains indecisive.

In the present, Allie becomes briefly lucid and remembers that the story Duke is reading is the story of how they met. Young Allie appears at Noah's doorstep, having left Lon at the hotel. Elderly Allie suddenly remembers her past; after finding out about her illness, she herself wrote their story in the notebook with instructions for Noah to "read this to me, and I'll come back to you". But Allie soon relapses, losing her memories of Noah. She panics, not understanding who he is, and has to be sedated. That same night Noah is hospitalised with what seems to be another heart attack.

When released from the hospital, Elderly Noah ("Duke") goes to Allie's room to find her lucid again. Allie questions Noah about what will happen to them when she loses her memory completely, and he reassures her that he will never leave her. She asks him if he thinks their love for each other is strong enough to "take them away together"; he replies that he thinks their love could do anything. After telling each other that they love one another, they both go to sleep in Allie's bed. The next morning, a nurse finds them dead in each other's arms.


Review:
I was taken by the story. Duke's voice captivated me as he reads the Notebook to Miss Allie. no wonder this is a famous romance movie, top 12 high-grossing romance movie at the moment. Noah and Allie draw you in. He was charming, she was lovable. Though, I find issues in Allie's parents being so carefree when their daughter spends every waking hour of the summer with Noah.

The storyline is beautiful, moving even. That Duke (elderly Noah) still has faith in Allie's ability to come back, to remember him.. The scene by the counter the night before they die, moves me. If I were the nurse, I would totally do the same. James Garner delivers the lines so convincingly! to be the subject of such devotion, man, I'd love that very much.

Lon was a honorable man too. The way he understood Allie, her reservations about him and her feelings. It is a rare man to love that much but still can release her to be with her first love.  

The issue I have with this film is that it's too perfect, too easy for Allie to get her dreams. True, she longs for Noah for 7 years but we didn't get to see her suffering, merely by mentions that she cried every night for a year. Maybe it's wrong to ask for that but I have this feeling that Noah is the only one suffering. He's stuck in the same place, even the girl he's seeing, Martha doesn't get him to love her. The way she said to him, after spending time to know Allie, was touching. "At least now I have something to look forward to-", meaning now she knows she will have to move on, that at least she knows where she's heading. away.

alahai. this is a sad story by Nicholas Sparks. I know I'd cry buckets reading it..