Perry is no Fool when it comes to Hayek
Fools Rush In (1997)
You don't understand the concept of a family! To you it's something you put up with on national holidays! - Isabel
When night club construction supervisor Alex Whitman (Matthew Perry) has a one night stand with Isabel Fuentes (Salma Hayek), a beautiful Mexican who works as a photographer in the Las Vegas clubs, he thinks nothing more of it. That is until three months later when Isabel turns up on his door step with the revelation that she is pregnant with his child. After a 24 hour romance they get married in a tacky Las Vegas chapel, and settle down to wedded bliss. But with the pressure of work, impending parenthood and massive cultural differences it looks as though that maybe they had rushed into things.
Whilst "Fools Rush In" is an enjoyable and likeable romantic comedy, it does suffer from 2 noticeable flaws which stops it from being anything more than just another average movie in an over crowded genre. The first of these flaws lies in the fact that it is completely predictable, due to it following the time honoured plot line which dominates this genre, boy meets girl, they fall in love, boy cocks up and then has to beg girl back. Not that this predictability spoils the overall enjoyment of "Fools Rush In", it just would have been nice if they had tried to add a twist to this standard tale.
The other problem lies in the casting of Matthew Perry in the lead role, not that his performance is in anyway terrible, in fact it is rather enjoyable. The problem lies in the fact that Perry has become synonymous with his character of Chandler Bing in the hit American sitcom 'Friends' and so for anyone who is familiar with the sitcom, it is incredibly difficult to try and disassociate him with this character. But saying that, "Fools Rush In" is an adequate and enjoyable comedy, with enough romance to put it on par with the numerous other films with in this genre.
Despite the lack of any real originality in the main plot line, the story does have a certain amount of well worked charm about it. With the initial meeting between the two love interests setting up the pace for how "Fools Rush In" will progress, and with the majority of the humour coming from Matthew Perry, it manages to grab your attention without forcing you to overly concentrate on what is going on. In fact the humorous side of the movie is one of the reasons why it manages to remain enjoyable and entertaining despite its predictability.
Whilst the story line is predictable, "Fools Rush In" does have some brilliant scenes which are remarkably realistic as well as entertaining, one of which is the initial meeting between Alex and Isabel's rather large and close knit Mexican family, which also sets up the cultural differences element, an important part of the films story, whilst also managing to make it humorous. There lies another reason why it manages to be entertaining, as whilst these sorts of scenarios are purposely sculptured to be humorous, they have some solid grounding which can be related to.
Although Matthew Perry is better known for his character of Chandler Bing in the sitcom "Friends", he actually puts in a reasonably decent performance in a film which at times feels like it has been written with him in mind. It would be wrong for me to say that Perry is the only reason why "Fools Rush In" manages to be enjoyable, but with him providing the bulk of the humour and having the majority of the screen time, his dominance is a key factor in its overall enjoyment. Where his performance does let the movie down is in the lack of any credible romantic chemistry between himself and co-star Salma Hayek, where at times he looks distinctly uncomfortable acting out some of the more intimate scenes.
Despite this lack of chemistry Salma Hayek does remarkably well to bring to life a character which seems to play second fiddle for the majority of the movie. Hayek may not be able to deliver her lines with the brilliant comic timing of Perry, but her ability to play a feisty, passionate character works exceptionally well against the more staid character of Alex Whitman.
What also lets "Fools Rush In" down is that although the film has many other characters, it never really uses them to their full extent, leaving Perry to dominate the majority of the screen time. In a rare case of nepotism, the character of Alex's father, Richard Whitman, is played by Matthew Perry's own father John Bennett Perry but sadly he doesn't get enough screen time to make any real comparisons between father and son.
Despite this being one of director Andy Tennant's first movies, he does show some early promise of things to come within the romantic comedy genre, as he went on to direct "Sweet Home Alabama" and the thoroughly enjoyable "Hitch". Although he may have been stuck with a rather predictable plot line and some rather unimaginative dialogue, he has managed to keep the film moving along at a very good pace. What he has also done brilliantly is to make light of such things as the cultural differences and the pressures of Alex's job without ruining the fact that they are realistic issues which do cause relationship problems.
As well as this, he has done really well to capture the atmosphere of the main locations through some wonderful scenic shots. But more importantly a marvellous sound track, which mixes some lovely Latino tunes, such as "Mi Tierra" performed by Gloria Estefan, with the more popular tunes which are more suited to the Las Vegas sound, such as Dean Martin's "Ain't That a Kick in the Head". Plus with a title which comes from an Elvis Presley number, there are a few of his tracks which also appear.
What this all boils down to is that despite its overly predictable story line which causes "Fools Rush In" to remain distinctively average, it has a lot of innocent charm about it which makes it a rather enjoyable and entertaining movie to watch. With a reasonable mixture of adequate performances, good humour and a very good soundtrack, it may not be the best ever film to hit the romantic-comedy genre but it is on par with the majority and does what it sets out to do. Although now in its tenth year, it does not show any signs of becoming dated and is not a bad film to watch.
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- Title: Fools Rush In
- Year: 1997
- Length: 109 mins
- Certificate: 12
- Genre: Comedy, Romance
- Director: Andy Tennant
- Cast: Matthew Perry, Salma Hayek, Jon Tenney, Carlos Gomez, Tomas Milian, John Bennett Perry, Stanley DeSantis, Anne Betancourt
- The Movie Scene Rating:
