Valentine's Day

Keep repeating "It's charming, it's charming." It's not but just keep repeating that. Valentine's Day offers a kind of tour de force of nearly two dozen name actors intersecting at the crossroads of forlorn love and undying devotion. The action takes place in L.A. so that instantly lets you know most of the cast didn't have to travel far to the set, plus it explains all the recognizable faces that pop in to deliver one-line retorts, like the angry guy in traffic (Joe Mantegna) or the airline rep (Larry Miller).
One the bright side, I never got that ridiculous feeling that you get with romcoms like The Ugly Truth or The Proposal or Did You Hear About the Morgans? Which is to say the Valentine's Day never tries to be incredulous. But as directed by Garry Marshall VD never attempts anything cutting edge. Here's a short list of some of the talent involved: Bradley Cooper, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Alba, Kathy Bates, Ashton Kutcher, Julia Roberts, Jessica Biel, Jamie Foxx, Topher Grace, Jennifer Garner, Patrick Dempsey, Eric Dane, and the list goes on.
The dark side is that all of the better actors, acclaimed newcomers like Hathaway who should know better, are just steering through this thing like they're mugging on a television comedy skit. It's one thing for Hathaway to take a paycheck role like Bride Wars where she at least plays a character and another thing to just coast by on her good looks and friendly smile. Multiply that by the number of actors on display.
Valentine's Day is a bumpy road with only slight detours onto the shoulder of same. Ironically in a movie full of actors doing their schtick there are moments of freshness when two current hotties, who don't even pretend they can act, appear. It feels alive because they don't try, they just are (themselves). Go figure, those two are the Taylors, Swift and Lautner.