Un beau jour

When movies of today try and capture that "old-fashioned" feeling, usually it's the "values" that they're trying to recapture, forgetting that if you don't make a good movie, what you're left with is two hours of preaching. This movie, on the other hand, may be trying to capture that "old-fashioned" feeling, but the values it's after are the values of craftsmanship and intelligence, two things rarely seen in comedies these days. Oh, yes, and chemistry; Clooney and Pfeiffer have it in spades here. The fact that it's set among the world of working parents and, for the most part, tries to get the details right, also helps. And, oh yeah, it's funny. It is a little cloying at times, and the end feels abrupt, but overall this is a pleasing movie.

The headlong screwball comedy of this breakneck romance of two stressed-out single parents is a delight from beginning to end. It has scenes as quick witted - and often as wackily off-kilter! - as the adults must be just in order to survive their average day. Stir love into this mess of two increasingly desparate modern lives and you get a miraculous souffle of a film, at once sharp and sweet.

No scene is laboured, no point is telegraphed, and - phenomenally for a modern American film - neither kids nor kittens are allowed to smother the audience in the nauseous layers of cutesiness that are usually applied. The scene with the analyst, where Clooney must obscure his account of his sex-life in an ever-more-surrealistic periphrasis involving iced cakes and fish, since his little daughter has to accompany him into the presumably crecheless analyst's surgery, and her dad is embarassed to expose her to such adult matters as he is obliged to reveal during the session, is a scene which is a model of intelligent and stylish comedy writing. The dialogue of both himself and his analyst finally founders on the increasingly strained comparisons and metaphors being attempted. The analyst begins to construct an alarmingly kinky lifestyle for his client out of what he takes to be Freudian suggestions - but which are, as noted, merely the product of old-fashioned seemliness - whereupon Clooney is forced to bring the whole towering edifice back down to earth when his version of the morning's business with the goldfish gets mixed up in the heady brew of symbolism: 'No. I mean fish. You know - 'Fish' fish?'

The humour is all good, never strained, and beautifully played by all the principals, including the wonderfully un-sentimentalised children. The transformation, stage-by-stage, of the harsh mutual competition and resentment that exists at first between these harassed adults, into an exhausted truce, by way of barely-restrained irritation, grudging gratitude, reluctant respect, and growing affection, is handled with considerable dramatic finesse throughout.

To produce the unlikely union of such an ill-assorted pair under such utterly unpropitious and unromantic circumstances is a comedic challenge of considerable proportions, and the makers of this film do an excellent job to bring it off at all. The spirits of Grant and Hepburn - even Beatrice and Benedict - are not too far away.

The only disappointment is to see how many people in the audience have gone home just as sour as when they arrived, judging from some of the comments here. But then, love curdles in any mean-spirited breast.

One particularly admires the fact that, at its conclusion, the film's romantic clincher - when the tired-out couple have to settle for just falling asleep together, despite their by now clearly desparate need for each other, - insists upon the importance of exactly this: Love, rather than merely lust, as the basis for an adult relationship.

Just occasionally, Hollywood still lets us have a grown-up entertainment. It makes a pleasant and wholesome change from the usual fare of adolescent dreams.

Okay, I LOVE romantic comedies so this is probably not too objective but... gee, I loved this movie. It follows an old formula that has worked so many times and that is still working: 2 people who can't stand each other at first happen to spend some time together and eventually find each other attractive. This requires 2 main things: 1.) Two great actors with wonderful chemistry 2.) An original and funny script We have seen this in so many movies like 6 Days 7 Nights with Anne Heche and Harrison Ford or You've Got Mail with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan or recently in The Runaway Bride with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere. I loved all these movies for they simply worked to charme me. One Fine Day fits perfectly to this list. George Clooney ( who proves that he can be a very funny guy) and Michelle Pfeiffer ( who gives a great performance in this movie) have very good chemistry and the script is very funny and romantic with some really great one-liners. This movie entertained me very much and it wasn't boring as I saw it the second time. For it's charme and fun, I give this movie 9/10.

I am speechless. This one is a classic movie, and I have no words to describe it. I wish they would make more movies like this one. Michelle Pfeiffer is brilliant as usual and George Clooney, the right choice as co-star.

I always expect the worst when I will see a romantic comedy. It's all very much the same, ultra sweet and incredibly predictable. One Fine Day does confirm this, however it isn't as bad as most of the movies in the genre. It's actually a quite enjoyable and funny film.

Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney did a very good job playing two people who are divorced, with a child, afraid to commit to someone else and with a hectic life. One day, they accidentally meet at the school where their kids go to school and during the day they keep meeting, however they hate each other and don't want to see the other ever again. But as the movie progresses, the relationship between the two changes from hating each other, to liking, to ... (this is a romantic comedy, I don't have to explain everything I hope).

Even though some parts aren't excellent, the entire movie is actually quite good and enjoyable. It shows a lot of stereotypes of course like the ex-husband who doesn't want to help his ex-wife when she drowns in all the work and who needs him to take care of the kid, the man who still seems to act like a little child... But when you can see past that, it's an excellent movie to watch together with your wife or girlfriend. You'll both enjoy it. I give it a 7/10.