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List Price: $9.98 | | Label: 20th Century Fox
Salesrank: 9250
Released: October 7, 2003 |
| Our Price: $3.90 |
| Used Price: $1.18 |
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MPAA Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Renee Zellweger (Chicago) and Ewan McGregor (Moulin Rouge) are the toast of the town in the most stylish romantic comedy of the year! From the producers of American Beauty and the director of Bring It On comes a teasing, tantalizing battle of the sexes that is "pure enchantment" (Daily News). When best-selling feminist author Barbara Novak (Zellweger) becomes the target of dashing playboy Catcher Block (McGregor), these sparring, would-be lovers generate enough sparks to fly you to the moon and back. In other words, the ultimate catch has just met his match!
Description of Down with Love (Widescreen Edition):
The bright, glossy world of Doris Day and Rock Hudson sex comedies gets a self-aware brush-up in Down with Love. Pillow-lipped Renée Zellweger (Chicago) plays Barbara Novak, the author of a bestselling book called Down with Love that advises women to focus on their careers and have sex à la carte--just like a man would. Determined to prove that Novak is just as vulnerable to love as any woman, dashingly chauvinist magazine writer Catcher Block (ever-charming Ewan McGregor, Moulin Rouge) pretends to be a courtly astronaut who wouldn't dream of putting his hand on a woman's knee. This piffle of a story seems like nothing more than an excuse for ironic double-entendres and dazzling production design, until a sneaky plot twist suddenly raises the stakes for the movie's end. As he always does, the brilliant David Hyde Pierce (Frasier) scores the most comic points as Block's fussy editor. --Bret Fetzer
Down with Love (Widescreen Edition) Reviews:
"Here's to love!" 
2009-11-27 - Down With Love is one of my favorite films. It's witty, hilarious, shameless and delightful! The dialogue is almost painfully clever in some parts, but Ewan and Renee manage to carry it off with aplomb. As just about every single other review has said, the lavish costuming and sets deserve full praise, and as some of the reviews have said, the movie really is phenomenal. If you dislike puns, wordplay, saturated colors, situational humor or kitchik endings, by all means--pass on the film. If any or all of the above appeal to you? Do yourself a favor and grab a copy of Down With Love.
Fun if forgettable retro comedy 
2009-10-28 - The Bottom Line:
Down with Love was assembled with great care and the two leads (particularly McGregor) are very good in their roles, but the film suffers the main problem endemic to almost all screwball comedies--the characters are all so ridiculous that the audience doesn't give a hoot about what happens to them--and so I can't really recommend it; it's a fun film, but it's very lightweight and an agonizingly long speech by Zellweger in the third act that slows the film down to a crawl doesn't much help matters.
2.5/4
Pillow Talking Lover, Please Come Back and Move Over, Darling....
2009-08-25 - This film is a perfect replication of the Doris Day/Rock Hudson films of the early sixties, right down to the designer outfits, high-strung friends and cameos from a zillion TV actors. Renee Zellwegger is a charmer of the first water....a girl I will officially dub right here and now as: "The Smirk". Her cute ways, (and those lawd-awmighty gams!) have you fascinated with her through the entire film. Director Peyton Reed, (who looks NOTHING like I expected him to look,) must have seen "Pillow Talk" and "Lover Come Back" a thousand times, because he has the feel and timing of those two movies, (basically the same film,) down to a science! Renee's Barbara Novak, a feminist author new to the big city, hates the very idea of a Catcher Block, a classic rom-com movie batchelor who makes Hugh Hefner look like he uses saltpeter, or so we're led to believe. Catcher is a well-known SWM hedonistic journalist of the early sixties for a Playboy/Esquire-type magazine called "Know". Between the end of the film and her initial entry into the movie, Babsy actually MEETS Catcher, disguised as someone else, and, as a matter of fact, falls for him rather heavily. At the last minute, his cover is blown and....
Well, the art direction is first-rate here, as someone managed to duplicate the look and feel of early sixties modern in every set in the flick! Sarah Paulson and David Hyde-Pierce make a VERY hard-to-believe couple in the film, but Paulson is as cute as ever. There is one split-screen scene here that is HILARIOUS and very naughty, between Zellwegger and McGregor and an O. Henry twist at the end that will have your jaw dropping!
I highly recommend this one, as really good nostalgically perfect comedies don't come along too often!
Art Direction Seared My Eyeballs
2009-07-31 - This is certainly an earnest homage to Late Fifties-Early Sixties battle of the sexes flicks particularly the Rock and Doris romps. Renee Zellweger and Ewan McGregor make for attractive leads and David Hyde-Pierce is simply stupendous in the Tony Randall part(Randall does a cameo here). There's a certain wit to the script and some clever double entendres present that wouldn't have been allowed in the earlier films. I can't give the flick the pass because the art direction-costume design is the height of garishness. Now I wasn't born until '63 but I've seen enough films from the era to state that the film's vomit inducing look is an act of self-indulgence. Maybe somebody should have seen an episode of "Madmen" to see how it's done right.
DOWN WITH LOVE...DOWN RIGHT WONDERFUL!
2009-06-13 - I rented this film, when I should have bought it. This is a delight. Renee Z is outstanding in this movie as is (surprisingly) Ewan McGregor. They both pull off this innuendo rich, tongue in cheek, vibrant comedy. It is a play on the 60's romantic comedies of switched identities, and falling in love under false pretenses.
It is Doris Day and Rock Hudson in hyperbole! It captures every nuance of every DD and RH film plot. It makes fun of the films but in a respectful way, not putting them down but almost as a comedic homage to the characters. The sets are outrageously stunning as are the costumes. Doris Day could wear bold and beautiful outfits and no one thought twice about her turbans or cape-like coats, and this film captures that stylistic flair. And her all white outfit from Pillow Talk makes a return in this film.
I wasn't sure about Ewan McGregor in this role, but boy was he more than great. The choreography and presentation was spot on and contributed to the pace of the film.
Anyone could enjoy this movie, but Doris Day/Rock Hudson fanatics will catch every subtle reference and characteristic that has been personified in Down with Love. Refreshing and engaging, it is a light hearted film but not at all simplistic in its presentation or message.
This is definitely a keeper!
