With the overly commercial Valentine’s Day holiday now just behind us, Netflix gave romantic comedy lovers a gift of one of their direct to streaming features this past week entitled Your Place or Mine. Starring Reese Witherspoon (Election) as the cutie Debbie Dunn, and Ashton Kutcher (No Strings Attached) as her best guy pal and former ex, Peter Coleman. They say never look a gift horse in the mouth, but was this movie a gift from Netflix or a present you would like to give back still fully wrapped?
Your Place Or Mine is set in New York City and California and follows these two former love doves as they navigate the single life while still being attached at the hip, only by cell phone, and living on opposite ends of each coast. Without a doubt, Reese Witherspoon is just plain too good for a bland role like this. I don’t blame her one bit for taking it though. The fans love to see her in these kinds of syrupy sweet characters, but a critic like me would insist she must be so bored just sleepwalking through a script like this. Ashton on the other hand, hasn’t had much work lately, so this still handsome 45-year-old has to take what he can get at this point understandably.
With a plot line about about as thin as I was before I started drinking at twenty-one, this new rom-com isn’t so fresh as it is partially stale. You may want to demand a refund, oh wait it’s free, well kinda sorta. Thank god this one wasn’t given the big screen treatment, you would be walking out to the lobby fibbing that the film skipped and demanding your money back. Beggars can’t be choosers, all kidding aside. This one is super easy to digest, but needs a lot of added spice; salt, pepper, garlic, and a bottle of hot sauce just to make it digestible.
Christopher’s “Meow” Score: “5” paws out of 10.
