The Ugly Truth

The Ugly Truth Review

starring: Katherine Heigl, Gerard Butler.
director: Robert Luketic

I saw this movie recently on Starz late at night and I was about to turn it off, but as soon as Gerard Butler came on the screen I stuck around to watch the whole thing only because in this movie he is playing a character that I wouldn't expect him to be cast in since he is so bulky and manly (i.e. 300). Anyways, the first things I noticed about this romantic comedy was how neat, clean, and nicely colored all of the settings, scenery and props were. It had some good scenery from Abby's house to her network building offices. You could definitely tell that the crew put a lot of work into making the movie look like a movie, which is a great choice for a romantic comedy in my opinion.

Katherine Heigl's acting was good, I have only seen her in two movies, I believe, and she seems to have played basically the same role, which she pulls off perfectly. The beautiful blonde who worries more about her significant others' status, opinions and views of life compared to the guys overall appearance; even though she would prefer a 'hot' guy over an ugly guy of course. The scene that I thought was really funny which I thought was going to be awkward (acting-wise) was when Abby had on her vibrating panties at the dinner with her co-workers. I think she pulled it off as good as anyone could have in that situation because I had the feeling like it could have been over-acted and embarrassing, but her timing, control, focus and supporting cast around her made the scene really funny LoL. Overall I think Katherine did a great job in this movie, given that she was almost in every single scene, which I didn't mind at all. She was the star, it was Abby's story and she took control convincingly.

The first time I saw a Gerard Butler film was when I watched 300, which is a complete 180 from Leonidas to Mike Chadway. Gerard seems to be very calm and cool in the romantic comedy genre of roles that he has been cast in lately, and even though he is a beast of a man he pulls off the man/woman interactions very well. His transition from just liking Abby as a friend/another girl to actually falling for her was acted really well because he let the viewer know in the right scenes at the right point of the movie (credit also to Robert Luketic). The part of the movie where he was pumping himself up to go to Abby's hotel room after they had kissed was inspiring because Mike was going to yet again take another chance at love, even though he has been denied, cheated on etc. by many other past loves/girlfriends. His character has a hard shell but his intentions and morals are pristine and honorable.

The only part that made me scratch my head was at the end when Abby and Mike were in the hot air balloon basket, in and on the air, and instead of retaliating to Abby's argumentative statements, Mike just let Abby know that he just told her he loved her and that she could hear everything he was saying but that. The old Mike Chadway would have kept arguing and sniping back at her with much pride and confidence. But, I guess things change once you are speaking to the one that holds your heart. The inevitable kiss in the hot air balloon ride probably just needed to get on with it and that was the quickest way to get the climax underway.

All in all I thought it was a great movie. It doesn't take much thinking about and doesn't tug on a lot of real emotions that I prefer in movies, but I still enjoyed it nonetheless as I do with almost any movie I watch.