Date Movie

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Date Movie

Promotional poster for Date Movie
Directed by Jason Friedberg
Aaron Seltzer
Produced by Jason Friedberg
Jack L. Murray
Paul Schiff
Aaron Seltzer
Written by Jason Friedberg
Aaron Seltzer
Starring Alyson Hannigan
Sophie Monk
Adam Campbell
Eddie Griffin
Fred Willard
Jennifer Coolidge
Mauricio Sanchez
Cinematography Shawn Maurer
Editing by Paul Hirsch
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Release date(s) February 17, 2006
Running time 83 min.
Language English
Budget $20 million
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Date Movie is a 2006 spoof of romantic comedies directed and written by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, two of the writers of the first Scary Movie. It stars Alyson Hannigan, Adam Campbell, Sophie Monk, Eddie Griffin, Fred Willard, Jennifer Coolidge and Mauricio Sanchez. The film was released on DVD on May 30, 2006.

Contents

[edit] Plot

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The Movie starts with Julia Jones, an overweight waitress who is a parody of Bridget Jones of the eponymous film, having a dream about walking to a mysterious man at an altar. The man turns around and, parodying Napoleon Dynamite, says "Idiot! Hell no I won't marry you, gosh! What would you do if you were in a situation like this?! Gosh! Gosh! Gosh! Gosh!" After she awakens, she gives a brief introduction to herself by a diary entry, while looking at her elderly neighbour's house, who has several cats bouncing around her in a comedic manner (at one point in the diary entry, two cats are seen either attacking or mounting each other in midair).

Julia is later seen flirting with men on the street to Milkshake, by Kelis, resulting in every man on the street fleeing in terror, sometimes killing themselves with weird items such as nailguns. Next we see her working at her family's Greek diner, where she meets her Greek father, her Indian mother, and her Japanese sister; and her father, who is actually black, points out that she is Jewish. When she asks her folks about love, she says "You mean I have to marry a Greek/Indian/Japanese/Jew?", to which her father replies "You're acting like that's hard to find." Her father then points to a worker resembling a janitor who has a rat looking out from the back of his pants, and Julia looks disgusted. We see her serving Grant Funkyerdodder [a parody of Hugh Grant] a cup of coffee, and knocking him out in the process. Her father then makes a comment on not wanting her to get married.

Depressed, Julia goes to see a date doctor, Hitch. Hitch takes her to West Side Customs, a parody of West Coast Customs from MTV's Pimp My Ride, where they "pimp her out". The now beautiful Julia then goes on a reality show, "Extreme Bachelor: Desperate Edition" where she sees Grant again. The reality show has a strange way of winning, where Grant is supposed to use a shotgun to knock out every woman whom he "doesn't want to bang." The last woman passes out, and Julia is left, afterwards the host says they'll have a romantic date at a restaurant, which turns out to be a restaurant named "A Restaurant." After a date, Grant, who was in love with Julia even before she was "Pimped" proposes to her at a jewelry store in a parody of the proposal scene at Tiffany's in Sweet Home Alabama.

After Grant proposes to Julia, they go to see a wedding planner. This Wedding Planner is a parody of the movie The Wedding Planner starring Jennifer Lopez. The Wedding Planner is named Jell-o, a parody of J-Lo, a name sometimes used to describe Lopez. Jell-o suggests that they have the wedding at a restaurant called Taco Butt (the slogan being "Think outside my buns"). Grant and Julia disagree with this, Jell-o shows them the entertainment she's planned, herself. She knocks her desk back with her very large buttocks and rips off her uniform, revealing that she's wearing a gold colored Jump suit and that she has fantastically large buttocks. Jell-o does some dance moves, and as shes backing up towards Grant and Julia, the two scream because the pants are about to break.

After a few scenes parodying Meet the Parents and Meet the Fockers, Grant informs Julia that Andy, who Grant wants to be the best man (just like My Best Friend's Wedding), will be arriving in town soon. Andy, as it turns out, is a Paris Hilton-like woman, (and Julia later questions why Grant said a woman was going to be his best man) who broke up with Grant only 3 weeks before. After meeting Andy, Julia and Grant go to counseling with an off-screen therapist in a parody of similar scenes in Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

While getting wedding dress fittings, Julia experiences electric shock and can suddenly hear everyone's thoughts [like Mel Gibson in What Women Want ]including those of Andy when Andy plots against her. The two women confront each other a la Kill Bill and have flashbacks which include a scene that parodys Dodgeball.

Andy wishes to ruin the wedding, and succeeds, causing a depressed Julia to return home. Julia decides to go ahead with her father's arranged marriage, until he calls it off at the last minute, showing Julia an issue of Cosmopolitan which has a strangely specific article by Grant in it. Julia then rushes to her apartment to meet up with Grant, who is just about to leave, and falls off the roof and into his arms, parodying Serendipity. They then get married, and have a honeymoon on Skull Island, (called Kong Island in the film) where they see Carmen Electra get her clothes ripped off by King Kong.

[edit] List of spoofed movies

Dr. Hitch (Tony Cox), parodying Will Smith's character in Hitch.
Dr. Hitch (Tony Cox), parodying Will Smith's character in Hitch.
Hannigan as Julia; overweight at the start of the movie.
Hannigan as Julia; overweight at the start of the movie.

[edit] Television Shows

[edit] Other References

[edit] MPAA

Rated PG-13 for continuous crude and sexual humor, including language. Not rated on DVD.

[edit] DVD

The DVD has been released on May 30, 2006.

The DVD comes with an English, French, 2 commentaries, a commentary featuring two critics who apparently did not like the film, and an audience track from a test screening.

[edit] Cast

[edit] Critical Reaction

Although Date Movie grossed US$ 48 million in the United States and $US 84 million worldwide, it was panned by critics on upon its release. On RottenTomatoes, the movie is considered "rotten" with an 8% on the tomatometer. Also, internationally renowned critic, Sean Ryan, has registered his disgust with the movie publicly multiple times, going so far as to call it 'The Holocaust of Movies.'

[edit] Box Office

First Week Gross US$ 22,000,611

Domestic US$ 55,368,488

Non-Domestic US$ 123,345,100

World-Wide US$ 178,604,194

[edit] Trivia

  • Frank has eight nipples, a reference to a deleted scene from Scary Movie.
  • The old cat woman that lived in the apartment across from Julia is the same actress who played the old lady who was undercover in Not Another Teen Movie.
  • In the scene where Sophie Monk imitates the Carl's Jr. commercial, she displays her disgust for meat on the audio commentary, citing she is a vegan. This is seen in the ending credits where Sophie is seen eating the burger, then scrunching up her face and spitting it out.
  • Hugh Grant was filming a movie at the same studio where Date Movie was filmed. When Alyson Hannigan had to get from her make-up trailer to the set with the exaggerated pimple on her face, Hugh ran into her and asked "What are they doing to you?" (This is because Hugh saw Alyson in her fat suit ensemble.)
  • The pus and the liposuctioned fat is tapioca pudding.
  • The hair on Grant's face at the end is yak hair.
  • In France, Date Movie is called Sexy Movie.
  • The theatrical poster is a double entendre in itself. It can be seen as an indirect reference to masturbation.
  • During the credits it is shown that the directors poured green slime on Carmen Electra as a prank during the King Kong scene.
  • In the Pretty Woman scene where Grant crossdresses as a woman, the set of clothes he wore is actually the same original set worn by Julia Roberts back in the original movie.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links