Addicted to Love

Sam (Matthew Broderick) is a placid astronomer who travels to NYC to win back the affections of his girlfriend, Linda. She has just left him for another man, throwing him into a chaotic state of mind. Finding her apartment house, Sam camps out at the vacant, tumbledown building across the street. He finds he has an excellent inside view of her apartment, due to a large picture window. Soon after, Maggie (Meg Ryan) joins him in his abode. It seems her ex-fiance Anton is the man living with Linda and Maggie is determined to wreak havoc in his life. After setting up a sound system, the peeping duo can even hear the apartment's conversations! Will Sam succeed in getting his girlfriend back while Maggie is messing up the life of her former love?

This funny premise translates into a humorous, enjoyable film. Anton and Linda are sitting ducks as the jilted pair formulate ways to undermine their happiness as a couple. Broderick and Ryan give lively performances that are amusing and, at times, touching. The ending may be predictable but is nonetheless satfisfying. Fans of romantic comedies will consider this one a fine addition to their list while non fans may relish the dastardly deeds ot Maggie and Sam.

Sam is an astronomer who has been together with his school teacher girlfriend Linda about forever.Then she takes a job in New York and finds a new man in her life, a suave French restaurateur Anton.He settles to an abandoned building across the street from Anton's apartment.He starts spying on Anton and his ex, he even borrows a camera obscura from his observatory which projects a life-size image from the apartment.Later he is joined by Maggie, Anton's bitter ex with vengeance on her mind.Now those two try to break up their old sweethearts, in a way or another.Addicted to Love (1997) is actor/director Griffin Dunne's directorial debut.And it's a very nice debut.Matthew Broderick does top-notch work as Sam.His character is a nice guy who ends up making the wrong decisions.Meg Ryan does a very nice job as Maggie.Her character may be a little annoying from time to time, but I guess she grows on you.Kelly Preston is terrific as Linda.Tchéky Karyo is brilliant as Anton.Maureen Stapleton makes a marvelous Nana.Nesbitt Blaisdell is very good as Ed Green.And so is Larry Pine as Street comic.Director's late great father Dominick Dunne portrays Matheson.The movie has pretty many funny and tragicomic scenes.One of them is when Linda's father reads the note to Sam his daughter has left.It is quite intriguing to watch all those ways they use to break up the couple and to make Anton's life miserable.The vendor's monkey wearing lipstick kisses Anton.They plant roaches in Anton's restaurant when a famous critic is dining there.You start feeling some sort of pity for the man when Maggie has caused him an allergic reaction from strawberries and Sam accidentally hurts the guy in a physical way.In a series of romantic comedies this is pretty original.

This is a great romantic comedy. Meg Ryan is on of the sweetest women in the world and you can't not love her. The story is very clever and funny. Meg Ryan and Matthew Broderick are great and delivers one of the best romantic comedies ever. This movie is really funny at times,but has that serious underline which builds up until the end of the movie. Maybe Meg Ryans best movie yet,beside "When Harry met Sally".

When you hear the words `romantic comedy', the first thing that springs to mind is some sugary, smiley, big-haired, feather-light Julia Roberts escapade. `Addicted to Love' presents us with the polar opposite to this, even if the premise is pretty the same as you'd find in the usual rom-com. The result is a deft, reckless, amusing and entertaining heavy-handed movie. There isn't much to bicker about here.

Meg Ryan and Matthew Broderick show tremendous colour and prove to be likeable characters as the vengeful stalkers. Tcheky Karyo is funny as the clumsy French fool. Kelly Preston is the least convicted of the four main characters, but is still relatively good.

The film has its own generally funny slapstick moments that compensate for the lack of verbal wit. The narrative that follows is good enough to keep you wanting more, and the jokes are all very well timed. The title Robert Palmer song adds to the reckless, but endearing epitome of the film. The directing styles aren't amazing, but they're hip and stylish for the most part.

Overall, it isn't film of the century and is far from outstanding, but `Addicted to Love' is original, entertaining and very funny for the most part. I give it 6.8 out of 10.

This generally enjoyable comedy should have been much better than it was, considering all the talent that worked on this film. The problem is, it isn't dark enough to be a dark comedy, but it is too dark to be a romantic comedy. Therefore, some of the revenge seemed too mean-spirited, and some of the sweet moments seemed out-of-place. BUT, even with that big of a problem, I still enjoyed the film. It was consistently funny and entertaining, and Broderick and Ryan both gave good performances. The best performance, however, was by Karyo, and he was probably my favorite thing about this movie.