“Take Care”– Movie Review

 

This week in my movie class, we saw the romantic comedy “Take Care” starring Leslie Bibb and Thomas Sadoski.

Synopsis

Following an accident, a woman is forced to ask her ex-boyfriend to look after her until she recovers – but will their renewed friendship threaten his new relationship?

Story

Incurring injuries after being hit by a car, Frannie (Bibb) returns home only to find that with a broken arm and leg she’s unable to care for herself.  Although she has friends and family not far away, Frannie quickly comes to the bitter realization that she cannot rely on them to help her.  Running out of options, Frannie reluctantly calls on Devon (Sadoski), her ex-boyfriend who now lives with his new girlfriend, Jodi (Betty Gilpin).  Although Devon is hesitant to agree, Frannie finally convinces him to do so when she reminds Devon that when they were together,she dutifully cared for him when he was ill. 

Every day for weeks, Devon checks in on Frannie, feeding her, taking her to doctor appointments, shampooing her hair and performing various other tasks.  During this time, Jodi grows increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of her boyfriend spending so much of his spare time with his ex-girlfriend; becoming understandably insecure, she expresses great concern that they are drifting apart the more Devon is with Frannie, depriving Jodi of his companionship.  Eventually, the inevitable occurs; with Devon and Frannie being around each other so much, they start to rekindle romantic feelings once again. 

Ultimately, Jodi finds out that this whole thing is rapidly spinning out of control and she is genuinely in danger of losing her man.  Finally, Jodi confronts Frannie about this and accuses her of delaying her recovery in order to steal Devon away from her.  Although Devon strenuously denies that Frannie is doing any such thing, Jodi doesn’t believe him; seeing how this arrangement is apparently driving a wedge in between Devon and Jodi, Frannie tells Devon that it is probably in everyone’s best interest if he were to stop immediately.  But as Frannie gradually recuperates, will Devon and Jodi be able to resume their relationship or have things gone too far by now?

Review

While there may be women who cringe at the term “Check Flick”, would it be any better to refer to a movie like this as “Girl Porn”?  Either way is an accurate description of “Take Care”.  Although a film that would obviously have great appeal for a female audience, you might not want to force your man to sit through this because there’s very little there that would appeal to him.   For something that is categorizing itself in the genre of Romantic Comedy, there’s a surfeit of “romantic” and a dearth of “comedy”; “Take Care” is either not very funny or not funny frequently enough, depending on your perspective. 

Why “Girl Porn”?  Thematically, “Take Care” focuses on an idea that captivates a number of women:  payback for a perceived injustice by a former lover.  Here, not only does Frannie get Devon to admit that he did her a disservice, she tries to win him back, effectively attempting to take him from another woman to whom he has been rather loyal thus far.  These are not exactly the most admirable characteristics of your protagonist.  Add to this the fact that Frannie is made out to be a needy, vulnerable and burdensome heroine and one must reasonably ask why the audience should be rooting for someone so weak and lacking in character. 

Following the screening, the instructor interviewed the writer-director of “Take Care”, Liz Tuccillo.  After directing her first feature, Tuccillo said that before she directs another, she would first like to take a course to learn technical information about cameras work.  She added that one of the most frustrating aspects of shooting had to do with filming in the streets of New York City – there were so many outdoor shots that got interrupted because of noises beyond her control (e.g., airplanes, ambulances, etc.) that they wound up having to do many takes.  A small budget independent film, they were scheduled to shoot for only 18 days, but wound up spending 19 because of rain on one day.