“Leslie. You’re just right for me,” is an actual line of dialogue in the Sanaa Hamri-helmed romcom, Just Wright.
That should really tell you everything you need to know about the type of film this is. But just in case you need more: it’s sappy, predictable, and cutesy in often cringe-inducing ways.
Most reviewers point to the “likability” of co-stars Queen Latifah and Common (well, all except those critics insistent on comparing Common to a serial killer, that is…). It’s true; despite this film’s obvious failings (an absurd lack of realism chief among them), you can’t help but feel warm and fuzzy watching Latifah grin blissfully while riding her bicycle next to a jogging Common.
Everyone in this movie has at least one or two moments of winning behavior; even Paula Patton’s one-dimensional golddigger is given a scene meant to redeem her in the end (although, by then, it’s far too late).
But ultimately, this flick suffers from an obvious, elephant-in-the-celluloid flaw: Queen Latifah has never had chemistry with a male co-star. And if there were ever a guy who’d make a convincing onscreen match for her, Common isn’t that dude.
To be fair, though, the odds were stacked against him, anyway. Aside from his atrocious acting, there was little in this plot that could convince a viewer that these two ever should’ve met, let alone lived together (and I’ll get back to that in a minute), and eventually fallen in love.
They meet at a gas station following a New Jersey Nets game, in which Common’s Scott McKnight was the lead scorer and Latifah’s Leslie Wright was a loud and proud fan. Common’s on the phone, expositing about some charity and how he wants to be more hands-on with the kids. He tells the person on the other line that he doesn’t know how to open the gas tank of his brand new designer sedan (maybe it’s a Bentley; I have no idea—and as far as I know, neither does he).
You’d have to be able to believe than a veteran NBA star would purchase a car he drives himself, but doesn’t know how to gas up, in order to believe the exchange he and Leslie have at the (surprisingly rundown) gas station. But let’s say we do believe this quality of Scott’s makes him charming instead of dense to a fault. Would he be so appreciative of Leslie popping the gas cap that he’d invite her to his exclusive in-home birthday party the following night?
No. No, he probably wouldn’t.
And considering how flirty she was with him, would Leslie have invited her godsister, Morgan (Paula Patton), an unemployed loafer whose only career objective is becoming an NBA wife?
No. No, she probably wouldn’t.
The movie is full of forced occurrences like this, including the following highly improbably gem: after Scott injures himself, Morgan (now his fiancée… after a short three months of dating) fires his blonde, thin physical therapist and hires Leslie (who she, of course, feels poses no romantic threat to her, presumably because she’s full-figured and tomboyish) as a live-in employee.
If both Scott and Leslie live in the same New Jersey city, and if Leslie has just purchased a fixer-upper house, why in the world would she need to live in Scott’s manse (which he already shares with his mother)? Is he gonna get a 3 am spasm she’ll be fired for not being present to massage?
Since I’m not telling you anything the trailer hasn’t already spoiled for you, Morgan dips on Scott, post-injury, and Leslie, who’s already living there, is around to pick up the pieces of his shattered heart and career.
The Scott-woos-Leslie section is where things really begin to fall apart. See, it was all fun and games when Queen Latifah was wearing Nets jerseys and track suits and tough-talking Scott into recovery, during strolls to Rucker Park. (In another seriously smirk-evincing turn: dude has a potentially career-ending knee-tear near the end of a season and he’s back on the court in time for the first game of the playoffs? … For the Nets? Okay, fam.)
But once they’re locking lips and sharing a silk-sheeted bed, everything falls impossibly flat. I felt guilty, practically cringing at Queen and Common futilely attempting to give each other the bedroom-eye. I couldn’t figure out why. Was it because Common’s eyes don’t emote and what should’ve come off as “smoldering” instead translated as creepy? Was it because Latifah seems like way too much woman for Common, taller than him in her “date heels,” and probably a much better baller than he on a court? Or was it simply because I’ve seen just about every Latifah flick that features her and a handsome male costar and I knew how this would play out—only this time, the filmmakers (and Latifah, as producer) pushed the envelope farther than she typically does, by featuring a morning after scene? (Most of her onscreen romantic trysts end in brief, chaste “stage-kissing.”)
In the end, it must’ve been all of the above, a series of fates conspiring against the believability of this onscreen pairing. But of course, this begs the question: can Latifah be effectively sexualized onscreen? Clearly, she wants to be. She’s been producing the films in which she stars for years now and nearly each features her with a male love interest, with whom she’s unable to generate many sparks.
Latifah is as likable as every reviewer says she is. She’s equally elegant and athletic, pretty and formidable. But her assets would probably be better served in action roles, asexual dramas or—and let’s just go ahead and say it—lesbian love stories. (Everyone knows that the one time Latifah played a lesbian was the one time she elicited a convincing onscreen kiss).
Ultimately, it seems that her agenda is women’s empowerment. Several lines in the film alluded to this idea that Leslie’s size and nontraditionally-feminine personality disqualified her from holding Scott’s interest. The film goes out of its way to prove the opposite true: that you can dress down and be full-figured and conversant in sports stats and still snag the guy “just by being yourself.”
It’s an age-old message, conveyed better in many a previous film… probably because the stars of those previous films were better able to sell us on the idea that they actually enjoyed making out with the guys they snagged.
