Film: New York, I Love You
Release date: 7th February 2011
Certificate: 15
Running time: 99 mins
Director: Fatih Akin, Yvan Attal, Randall Balsmeyer, Allen Hughes, Shunji Iwai, Wen Jiang, Shekhar Kapur, Joshua Marston, Mira Nair, Natalie Portman, Brett Ratner
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Justin Bartha, Andy Garcia, Hayden Christensen, Rachel Bilson
Genre: Drama/Romance
Studio: Universal
Format: DVD
Country: France/USA
This is an English-Language release.
With the same template as Paris, Je T’aime, and with an array of directorial talents, comes a true Valentines Day staple. A romantic comedy featuring a number of familiar faces, falling in love in hip bars, on the sidewalks, in taxis – with its A-list clout comes a pastiche of short love stories in New York, I Love You.
Around this time of year come a plethora of date movies. Tinted with ideas of romance and with varying degrees of seriousness. New York, I Love You, follows a similar path to many romantic comedies of years’ past, of the ilk of Love Actually, Valentines Day and He’s Just Not That Into You, in telling a number of inter-linking stories, but with a twist. Each of the eleven stories run for just eight minutes or so, each one overseen by a different director.
The film boasts a starry cast, with the likes of Bradley Cooper, Natalie Portman (who also makes her directorial debut), Hayden Christensen and Orlando Bloom more than capable of articulating every anecdotal tribute to New York City. And, of course, as one might expect, actors who play a major part in one story often criss-cross and turn up in one or two of the others.
Much like its predecessor Paris, Je T’aime, each director is encouraged to focus his or her energy on presenting love blossoming in the big city. From tales of lost love between husband and wife, to the unspoken lust of a Jewish girl for a man of Indian descent, and the seeds of puppy love, comes a montage for the modern romantic, with many more themes explored throughout…
The film begins as it means to go on, with the self-glorifying images of Manhattan Bridge and yellow taxis, and an entertaining exchange between two men who accidentally jump in the same cab. With an engrossing encounter between a thief and a girl whose attention he is trying to attract by stealing from her soon to follow, it is easy to warm to the witty charms of each character.
The writing throughout is particularly praiseworthy, and enables the audience to connect with the characters despite their abbreviated time on screen. Interactions are usually fuelled with witty conversations, and in fact, New York, I Love You functions best when comedy is the prevailing theme. One of the most memorable stories is that involving a pharmacist who convinces a young boy to take his daughter to the prom. As it turns out, the daughter is handicapped, but the film elects to stay on the more humourous side of proceedings, building to a side-splitting twist at the climax of this particular story.
As time goes on, however, certain patterns become apparent. Each anecdote contains enough narrative and back-story to construct an entire film, and the overriding issue the film never quite escapes is that each director has been required to cut and paste each scene so that every aspect is covered in eight minutes. Cutting corners like this means that the director has to rely on certain subtleties to get their message across. Sometimes this is conveyed simply with a look we don’t quite understand, but often a story passes us by without us ever quite grasping its intentions, other than the rather unsubtle suggestion to the audience of, “Look how beautiful New York is, you should come here.”
Whereas its more popular ancestors Paris Je T’aime and Love Actually appeared more well-rounded, New York, I Love You’s style alienates its audience just as we lean forward to watch more. Every intriguing, heart-warming story is immediately followed by something so far-fetched we cannot identify with the themes.
This is not the only area in which the film struggles to satisfy its audience - sadly, in places, the film is guilty of taking itself far too seriously. Very often the stories feel far too short to have conveyed any emotion at all, leaving us with a feeling that the film may only be appreciated by a pretentious critic somewhere.
As one might expect, different stories invoke differing reactions, and although one particular snippet featuring Radiohead’s No Surprises makes for an especially moving scene, it remains difficult to feel like the sum of the parts is greater than than the whole.
New York, I Love You almost feels like a mini film festival unto itself, anthologising several tenuously linked stories. In amongst the odd charming anecdote, it is easy to become lost in what is essentially an introverted work of self-importance. MC
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