Grade: D

I’ve been waiting for a good romantic comedy to come around for a long time. Unfortunately “The Break Up” isn’t it. I’m sorry to say that there is nothing funny about this movie. It’s depressing, actually. The whole thing is flawed from the start. We see Brook (Jennifer Aniston) and Gary (Vince Vaughn) meet cute at a baseball game. Then over the opening credits we get a montage of photographs of the two of them lovey-dovey. Their first scene together starts with a fight, and the rest of the movie goes downhill from there. What we have here, people, is a failure to communicate. Instead of talking out their issues, going to therapy, having any kind of adult interaction, what the characters choose to do is to embark on a seriies of revenge tactics meant to get the other party to come around and apologize… huh? I guess if they actually did take the high road there wouldn’t be any material for a movie. But then again, there’s not much movie here anyway. I found myself thinking: “What’s the point?” These are two unlikeable people. We never see them interact happily with each other. We never have any reason to root for them to get back together. And we’re not even rewarded with a happy ending. Dismal. Then there’s a waste of talent that parades through, Ann-Margret, Judy Davis, Jason Bateman – what are they doing there? Why would they sign up to be a supporting player in this dreck? The only character to give me a chuckle is Jon Favreau’s bartender, who has a great scene with Vince Vaughn. I also liked Vincent D’Onofrio as Vince’s big brother – great casting there. But really, if you saw the previews for “The Break Up” you’ve seen the best bits. Jennifer shows off her toned, tanned body – Vince mugs for the camera. There’s no audience for this movie. It’s a terrible date movie – you’ll be arguing and depressed afterwards. Teens will hate it because they won’t understand it. And adults will hate it because they’ve been there, done that, and gotten over it years ago. Spare yourself. go see Cars instead!