Whoever wins the Academy Award for best actress this year will have some tough choices. Should she take advantage of her accomplishment by receiving bigger paychecks and an increase in the quality of scripts? Or go the way of Gwyneth Paltrow, winner for "Shakespeare in Love," and appear in mindless, aimless films like "View From the Top"?
"View From the Top" is helmed by second-rate Brazilian filmmaker Bruno Barreto ("Bossa Nova"). To give him some slack, it is doubtful if anyone could have made a decent film from Eric Wald's pointless screenplay.
Two questions viewers will be left with are: "How did that ever get made?" and "What is Paltrow doing with this script ... is she really that desperate for work?"
Paltrow, who seems to be quickly wearing out the goodwill she won with her Oscar, plays Donna Jensen, a nobody whose only dream is to leave her Silver Springs trailer park behind.
She wants to get out of her small town and make something of herself. At this point, "View" looks like it is setting us up for a theme that suggests people who fly for a living are people who want to escape from their prior lives.
But that thought proves too deep after Donna then lands a flight attendant job with Sierra Airlines, wearing a 1970s-era Southwest Airlines hooker outfit. After realizing they are stuck in dead-end jobs, Donna convinces her two best friends to apply with her for positions within the more prestigious Royalty Airlines.
Donna and Christine (Christina Applegate) go through training, giving Mike Myers a chance to liven up the film as John Whitney, a cross-eyed executive who is bitter he cannot fly. Myers gives the film its only distinction.
During his training class, Whitney instructs everyone to stand up, crouch down and look under their desk where there is a one dollar bill taped. This lesson is to show you "have to get off your ass if you want to make a buck."
Unfortunately, Donna has to have a love interest, and the burden falls on Mark Ruffalo to play a law student smitten with the golden haired, small-brained flight attendant.
Candice Bergen plays Donna's mentor, a retired flight attendant who gained fame and fortune by writing her memoirs. Donna becomes infatuated with her, thus allowing Bergen to appear whenever a character's morale needs to be uplifted.
Some talented people, like Josh Malina and Rob Lowe from TV's "The West Wing," appear in little more than cameos, as does Kelly Preston. Myers and Bergen are obviously included for their comedic personalities, but Paltrow strains for laughs by wearing hideous outfits and losing in a catfight.
Paltrow's ambiguity and awkwardness mar any chance this movie had for effectiveness. As a whole, the film is so inconsistent and disconnected that the viewer is left with the overriding impression that it's all supposed to be a joke. But onscreen, people seem to be taking the ridiculous script seriously.
Considering that "View" is released by the prestigious Miramax Films, known for crackerjack fare most recently including "Chicago" and "Gangs of New York" and that Paltrow excels in challenging roles both in films and on the stage, one can only guess how this terminally bland sitcom-film will pass muster with even an MTV audience.
The story is predictable from the get-go, Mike Myers' crossed right eye is the sum of the gifted comic's repertore and the normally-talented Mark Ruffalo looks embarrassed to be in such peas-and-carrots action.
For some reason, every indication is given on both the ad posters and in the initial section of the movie that it is set in the 1960s (hair styles and costumes) but a look at a five-Euro bill and a note on the seat of a passenger in first class to Paris, the cell phones, and the use of the word "guys" when referring to women and "Oh-my-God" to represent clever conversation, are altogether contemporary.
Overall, the movie invites guys to drool over Paltrow and girls to debate on whether she looks better with her skirts cut to mid-thigh or to within an inch of her butt.
A movie might be horrible when professional critics walk out, but when its target audience cannot make it through a film, it is obvious the film is a failure.
Photo: Meredith Forrest Kulwicki
