New Line Cinema’s “Going the Distance” a romantic comedy starring Drew Barrymore and Justin Long is not a heart racing, teary eyed, lips quivering film. This was not a cracking up, hit your neighbor kind of funny film. This was not a must see; let’s buy it on DVD; make sure to pre-order your theater ticket film. This film was an unrealistic, poor acting film that dragged you along with it.
What starts as casual dating for Erin (Barrymore) and Garett (Long), develops into a loving, exclusive relationship. The difficulty begins six weeks later when Erin’s summer internship at the New York Sentinel ends and she must leave New York and move back to San Francisco. The 2,000 miles separating them creates room for phone sex, air planes flights and a lot of frustration. While Erin and Garett try to make the relationship work, the distance begins to take a toll. Erin searches every newspaper and magazine in New York for job openings, while Garett contacts every record label in San Francisco. All calls lead to dead ends. With the frustration building, someone must now decide who will set their career dreams aside and move.
The first night Erin and Garett met, they drank alcohol, smoked pot, had sex, and displayed their decorated language with curse words in every other sentence. Although the film attempts to follow the common “just have fun” attitude of modern times, this is not a positive message, especially for those who believe that movies are anywhere close to reality. That magical night transformed into a loving, flourishing relationship for Erin and Garett. Yeah, because we hear about these stories happening all the time in real life, right? It is so typical of Hollywood to turn sex into love in a matter of minutes.
This is definitely not your family film. The film is rated R because of explicit language use, sexual content, and drug use. The script goes overboard with the profane language-pushing the belief that Barrymore can still play the role of a young, misdirected girl. The film had a few ha-ha moments, but the comedy levels were low, although, the redundant one liners soared. As the movie progressed, the minutes dragged by even slower. The dialogue was boring and lacked originality. Garett’s friends produced the majority of the laughs. Most of the jokes revolved around sex and a weird infatuation with pigeons. This movie was predictable. In the beginning of the relationship everything was wonderful, as it progressed there was conflict, and in the end there was happily ever after. Who would have guessed?
Sitting inside a boring classroom listening to your monotone teacher speak, while wondering how much longer you must endure this torture is what it feels like to watch this movie. Save your money and time and don’t go the distance for it.
