Forces Of Nature

A lazy, manipulative, smug and thoroughly calculated rom-com/road-movie with no heart to speak of and both eyes firmly fixed on the box-office, Forces of Nature is another market-driven exercise in summertime schmaltz.

But while it's impossible to truly warm to, the film is far from being the worst such Hollywood outing ever - the saccharine-sweetness of the project is kept relatively in check rather than being laid on with a trowel, and it pitches itself as more of a screwball comedy than an out-and-out tearjerker, which at least makes it bearable to sit through.

A predictably by-numbers narrative is eased slightly by a reasonably zippy script, as the film plunges its heroes unwillingly together in apparent tribute to the Cary Grant/Katharine Hepburn outings of the '40s.

While neither of the actors are quite fit to lace their predecessors' boots, they slave valiantly to make the most of what they're given. Ben Affleck plays a happily-engaged nice-guy en route to his wedding in Savannah, whose travel plans are interrupted by a preposterous series of convenient natural catastrophes, while kooky weirdo-chick Bullock hooks up with him at an early stage and Affleck senses his fidelity being put to the test.

Bullock is badly out of her depth in the role: her character is intended to come across as a free-spirited live-for-today adventuress, and this sits hopelessly ill with Bullock's long-established boring-girl-next-door persona. Affleck fares somewhat better in a more straightforward role, some of his facial expressions throughout providing moments of genuine comedy, but the chemistry just isn't there, and the mishap-laden plot doesn't really throw up enough sense of danger to lend it any real credibility.

All things are relative - I've seen worse, and I'm sure I'll see worse again.