MORNING GLORY - REVIEW


Had Morning Glory not been directed by the man behind *shudder* Notting Hill and had it not been built specifically for the Devil Wears Prada audience, we could have had a decent, original, funny, even touching little film here. Unfortunately though, what we get is Anchorman's great grandmother.

There was potential here to really explore the inherent absurdity of morning TV daytime shows: the subject matter pretty much gives everything on a plate. Alas, the film finds Rachel MacAdams' painfully irritating lead way more interesting than all that and we are forced to sit through endless scenes of her acting all cute, all professional, all self-involved before we get to the good stuff, namely: Ford and Keaton.

Devil Wears Prada worked because of its seemingly heartless "villain" and a just about bearable protagonist in Anne Hathaway. Pretty much exactly the same formula is applied here with a terrific "villain" in Harrison Ford (on wonderfully grumpy form here) and great support from Keaton. But MacAdams single-handedly kills any hope of liking Morning Glory fully.

The whole thing feels like a missed opportunity. It's never as cute, funny or charming as it thinks it is and with such an easy target, it's almost unforgivable that the film never really delivers. Hell, I kept wishing for Judd Apatow, Will Ferrell and the gang to walk in and fix the damn thing! Even God-among-Men Jeff Goldblum is underused! For shame...

But I'm being harsh. There are funny moments here and there and on the whole it's really not that bad and pretty forgivable for a Friday night in. Ford is great and gives a fun, even touching performance, Keaton is on familiar territory but is always a safe bet and the rest of the supporting cast is fine.

It's harmless enough and occasionally pretty funny but by the end you'll just be wishing you were watching a better film...so why not just do THAT?

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