Back on February 7th, 2003, Lynda Obst Productions released How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days, a romantic comedy that would turn out to be a huge hit and a staple for many in the rom-com genre, even 15 years later. This Donald Petrie directed movie stars a few of Hollywood's biggest stars, both back then and present day, such as Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey. This 116 minute movie, making over $23,000,000 on its opening weekend, follows the story of two 20-somethings living in New York City whom are each looking for a promotion in their occupation. Andie Anderson is an aspiring journalist who is a writer for Composure magazine, but wants to write hard-hitting expose pieces about “things that matter”, rather than writing drab pieces for this ho-hum magazine. In an attempt to become the journalist she desires to be, Andie makes a bet with her boss. She is assigned to write an article on how to lose a guy in ten days, and if she writes a strong article, she will be permitted to write more substantial pieces. In order to achieve her goal, Andie will be using every cliche trick in the book that usually drives men away. Now, in comes Benjamin Barry. He not only will be used as the subject of Andie’s article, but he also has a bet with his boss. Ben is a “hot-shot” advertising agent who is tired of selling just run-of-the-mill things and has bigger dreams. He sets his sights high and decides he wants to instead sell diamonds. His boss says that if he can make any random woman fall in love with him, like he says he can, and bring her to the company ball in ten days, he will prove himself worthy of the elusive diamond account. So, as you may have expected by now, Andie and Ben are set up. However, they are set up by Ben’s co-workers in an attempt to ruin Ben’s chances of getting the account, but also prove to make it very difficult for Andie to “lose the guy”. The movie continues by following the extremely rocky “relationship” between Ben and Andie and leaves the audience wondering, “how is this going to work out for either of them?” The guy needs the girl to love him and the girl needs the guy to despise her, sounds like a tricky situation, right? Well, just like most rom-com movies, everything works out in the end when they realize they are actually falling for each other after putting their work antics aside.
One thing I found interesting in the movie is that the main characters in this movie are very alike. Both Andie and Ben prove to be determined in their goals, proving that they each care a lot about doing well and moving up in their occupations. They each are very head-strong and strong-willed, making it difficult for each of them during their individual endeavors. Each of them have a hard time exerting a lot of emotion into the relationship, where Andie finds it difficult to be the “clingy” girlfriend she needs to be and Ben, on the other hand, proves that he is a bit closed off to his feelings. I found it interesting to watch each of their personalities drastically change when they were around each other versus when they aren’t. I also found that the characters didn’t necessarily stick to the normal gender standards that are usually in movie, where Andie proved to really enjoy basketball and Ben at one point voluntarily offered to change his nephews diaper and I thought this aspect made the movie a little more interesting and entertaining.
Another thing I found interesting in this movie is how they kept up the concept of time. The whole movie is based around the idea that they each have ten days to accomplish their goals and win their bets. In order to keep that concept of ten days alive in the movie, I noticed they used the NBA playoffs as a way to keep track of it. They introduced the NBA playoffs into the movie in the very beginning and the first date between Ben and Andie took place at on of the games. The games continued to take place throughout the movie and I thought it was extremely clever to use this concept since NBA playoff games take place in a short amount of time.
Overall, I would recommend this movie, but only if you’re looking for a bit of a cheesy rom-com to watch. I do think its a well made movie but I definitely don’t think it’s for everyone. It was pretty obvious, to me at least, that the two characters would end up together in the end. I also found myself wondering in the end what happened with their jobs in the end, since their occupations are the reason this whole thing started and they never told the audience exactly what happened. Other than that, I think the acting was very good and the plot of the story and how it plays out is pretty unique. I can’t say I would watch it again, but I’m did enjoy myself while watching it for the first time!
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