Susan Granger’s review of “Catch and Release” (Columbia Pictures)
If you’re a die-hard Jennifer Garner fan, you’ll probably have seen romantic comedy on opening day; if not, don’t bother with this chick-flick now.
Garner plays bride-to-be Gray Wheeler whose supposedly perfect fiancŽ dies in a fishing accident in Boulder, Colorado. Dressed in black, she welcomes guests to his wake just as the wedding caterers pull up. Oh so coincidentally, she winds up in the bathroom which her late husband’s lothario childhood buddy from Malibu, Fritz (Timothy Olyphant), has staked out to make it with the event planner.
“How could he have been friends with you?” she sputters. “You’re everything he hated.”
Right away, the concept strains credulity. Did no one notify the caterers of the groom’s demise? And why wouldn’t she lock the door of the bathroom? And so it goes.
Predictably – and inevitably – Gray and Fritz get it on, moving into a house that belongs to two of her fiancŽ’s friends (Kevin Smith, Sam Jaeger). Meanwhile, Gray discovers troubling secrets that her fiancŽ kept from her – like the fact that he was a millionaire and sending a monthly check for $3,000 to a massage therapist (Juliette Lewis) in L.A., the mother of his son, Mattie (Joshua Friesen). As if the tiny pad weren’t crowded enough, Mattie and his mother also move in. It’s all quite simpering and sappy.
This marks the directorial debut of Susannah Grant, who wrote “Charlotte’s Web,” “Erin Brockovich,” and “In Her Shoes,” and her inexperience behind the camera is all too evident. So is Jennifer Garner’s tentativeness, since shooting took place while she was newly pregnant back in 2005 and obviously self-conscious about her rounding belly. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Catch and Release” is a floundering 4. Throw it back.
