The Perfect Match

The movie tries hard not to be your typical Romantic comedy. It's a little too up beat and hip and does not focus on the romance or the comedy as much as it should

Charlie is the archetype alpha male with the fly job the fly crib and a odd hang up about settling down that makes him vastly different than his two married friends, and gives us a bunch of scenes of them sitting around drinking lattes or working out where they can debate about this. Than he meets that chick who changes his mind about it.

I got to admit, that I did like how the situation develop, it was an interesting twist.

But Charlie does follow the formula for the rom-com lead to the tea, making it hard for Terrence J to shine his charm through the staleness of it. I did enjoy seeing him try, however.

Paula Patton's role as Charlie's sister is way too short for it to be such a key note that it was. It's almost like they added it afterwards in order to make the movie make more sense than it would have without.

I wished it was funnier than it was, too. Not even Donald Faison whose job it was to be funny as Charlie's best friend, was making me laugh.

Maybe I should not say anything about French Montana's over dressed cameo appearance. He was not in the movie cause he can act, but man, could they not find someone better on camera for this?

Even the hot love scenes were kinda bland after awhile.

Overall, I did like how the story played out, not enough to make it worthy of my cash at the box office. Catch it when it comes on cable late at night.

"No strings that's what we said. You knew what we were getting into." Charlie (Jenkins) is living his single life. He can do what he wants, be with who he wants and lives by his unbending rules. When his friends call him on his lifestyle choices he sets out to prove he can be anything he wants. When Eva (Ventura) enters the picture he decides to accept a bet that he can have an actual relationship for a few weeks, Charlie didn't realize what would happen. This is not a bad movie, but almost a little too generic to be good. There are a few twists in this to make it a little different, but really 10 minutes into the movie you can predict what is going to happen and you will be about 90% correct. The acting is OK and the writing is OK, but that's the big problem with the movie. It is just OK. Nothing all that exciting and entertaining and I found myself daydreaming a few times and wasn't paying attention to some scenes, but because of the generic aspect I didn't feel like I missed anything. Overall, I know some people will really enjoy this but as for me it was a movie I have seen a million times and didn't really add enough to make it stand out. I give this a C.

Romantic comedies have changed a bit since their late nineties/early two thousands heyday. Gone are the days of Julia Roberts being, "just a girl, in front of a boy, asking him to love her." It seems somewhere around 2005, Hollywood finally got the message and decided unrealistic, overly romantic gestures like stopping the girl at the airport, or stopping her from marrying the wrong guy at the altar was just a tad too much. Thus we get something like The Perfect Match, a movie sans the final act clichés but still clinging to old attitudes about men and women.

Charlie (Jenkins) is just not the dating type. Living large as a successful music agent and budding photographer, Charlie spends his days meeting up with, and quickly discarding a bevy of attractive women. His friends; a regular cabal of walking stock-characters, tell him he should settle down lest he spend his life alone. Then he meets Karen (Hawk) a women who wants to escape from the long-term relationship feedback loop. "I just want something without any attachments," she says to Charlie as the two get to know each other. Thus what starts as a simple arrangement between two young, attractive people, turns into something more complicated.

Despite some welcomed changes to the genre, The Perfect Match is beat by beat, very beholden to a comedic style that hasn't been in vogue since the nineties. Charlie and his friends Victor (Riley) and Rick (Faison) joke around about how unreasonable, shrewish and/or costly their women are while falling into sitcom dad situations that could easily be avoided if they communicated better. Charlie's sister Sherry (Patton) takes no time explaining to the audience that she's a therapist and delves into Charlie's inner thoughts before we even have the time to get to know him. The first act is so paint by numbers that there's actually something kind of appealing to the menagerie of dated gender role jokes. It's like peering into the psyche of a Bill Burr fan or the Facebook feed of a college sophomore; it's all "women be like _______" jokes.

The characterizations vary not just actor to actor but scene to scene. One minute Robert Christopher Riley's character is noticeably panicked about the cost of his wedding to his fiancée Ginger (London). The next moment he's completely zen without much resolution. Cassie Ventura leans into the testy Latina stereotype which surprisingly is the most consistent and interesting supporting character in the film. Faison brings much needed levity whenever he's on screen but he, along with everyone else is still just reading their lines, collecting a paycheck and going home.

The exact same thing can be said about the main romance, which lacks everything but the bare cliché. Largely established with a coiling array of lovemaking scenes set to R&B music, Jenkins and Hawk seem completely at odds with each other. The chemistry was wholly absent and provides no warmth the audience can cling to. When our smitten hero comes face to face with the perfunctory third act romantic misunderstanding, his reaction is complete overkill, given the fact that he barely knows Karen.

In-spite of all it's various faults, I cannot deny this movie will be exactly what many are looking for. It's a de-fanged romantic comedy with a salient moral about not being a scrub. It provides some fun eye-candy for both sexes and it wasn't directed terribly. In-fact I would argue this kind of material is beneath director Bille Woodruff who has a way with composition and ensemble blocking. It's not Love & Basketball (2000), heck it's not even Think Like a Man (2012) but at least it's heart is in the right place.

No pun intended - the movie title is aware that it is a pun too ... at least that is how I read it. Nothing here is really perfect ... and nothing really can ever be perfect ... maybe momentarily ... but not over a longer period of time. That said, beware how you watch this ... I started watching a German dubbed version (yes I do speak/understand German too) ... and it was one of the worst things you can imagine.

Luckily a different streaming service did have the original soundtrack ... and it made the movie way better ... I don't think I would have given this anything over a 3 out of 10 if I had continued watching it in German.

I was surprised on how many quite well known individuals were involved in this movie. Maybe I do watch too many movies - if there is such a thing of course. This does have flaws (cliches, sexy time without too much of the sexy time on display ... although I reckon some will prefer it that way, to name a few things) ... but the charm of those involved should be enough to help you enjoy this quite straightforward movie ...

From the start I knew this movie would be just bad... But it didn't stop me from giving it a shot. I should have known better.. The pros are definitely beautiful screens of California, good looking and likable people, nice music here and there. In general, the visual side is quite enjoyable. The cons however, outweight the pros. The script about a womanizer who finally falls in love has been repeated dozens of times! The predictability isn't a bad thing. Here, unfortunately, it is neither lighthearted nor funny. Characters are stereotypical, flat and one dimensional. Easily forgettable. Forced jokes, fake chemistry and - to me- annoying ending without proper lessons learned. Next time I'll follow my gut instinct and select another movie.