Jake Gyllenhaal shines in unusual boy meets girl tale with Anne Hathaway

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CAHIR O'DOHERTY,

Irish Voice Reporter

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Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway in a scene from Love & Other Drugs

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Weirdly, the movie also veers into the gross out comedy terrain of films like American Pie courtesy of a diverting performance by Josh Gad, who plays Gyllenhaal’s less attractive brother Josh.

The early reports are true. There is indeed a lot of nudity in Love & Other Drugs, and for the most part it really is central to the plot, but all the comedy elements seemed designed to distract us from a simple truth -- two gorgeous people have fallen in love and one of them has an incurable debilitating disease that will eventually incapacitate her for the rest of her life.

It’s a grim enough reality check, but it seems the director and writers don’t want to confront it head on without retreating back into comedy to lighten the mood. The film suffers from this lack of resolve. By taking the focus of the dilemma faced by the leads, the film often loses its capacity to engage you.

Gyllenhaal knows the simplicity of the central story line would be enough to sell this film 100 times over, and neither he nor Hathaway are served by a director and studio hedging its bets to pull the widest audience.

In the end Love & Other Drugs isn’t one movie, it’s three -- the affecting story of a budding romance complicated by incurable illness; a satire on amoral capitalism gone wrong; and a peek through your fingers gross-out comedy. One of those choices would really have been enough.

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