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If movies had personality disorders this movie would have been diagnosed with “schizophrenia”. It seems like it shifts between different genres without being aware of the other genre even being there. Whenever that happens it mostly is at the very ending of a movie. Hollow Man for instance; thriller the first hour, slasher the last 20 minutes. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. In Little Black Book it doesn’t…
The setup is standard romcom-material. A guy leaves town for work but forgets his PDA. His girlfriend played by Brittany Murphy must look some numbers up in his PDA form him and discovers traces of former relationships in it. No way you say, Yes way I say! Well of course this has to be investigated and it just so happens that our little insecure female lead has just been hired to work on a local talkshow. Now she has the opportunity and resources to see what his ex-girlfriends are like. Let the comedy begin!
And that’s were the movie fails. Sure, it has it’s fun moments but most of the time it’s just a simple drama. Except for the ending where it really comes clear that this movie was just a film about how television and making a career works. Partly responsible for the failing is the marketing-department. This movie is marketed as a romantic comedy but in the end it’s more of a drama.
There’s nothing wrong with the acting: Britanny plays her role with sparkling freshness and she is aided by oscarwinners Kathy Bates and Holly Hunter. The topbilling credit for a male part goes to Ron Livingston. He might be the object whom the story centers around, his role can only be described as an extended cameo. There’s also a dog. Even he has more screentime than poor Ron.
This movie is watchable, but nothing more than that. No repeat viewings for me, and I’ve seen “Jack Frost” (Not the one with Michael Keaton!) multiple times…
