Rating:  

Fox 2000 Pictures, Regency Enterprises, New Regency, Stuber Pictures, Bedford Falls Productions, and Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.

Written by: Charles Randolph, Edward Zwick, and Marshall Herskovitz, adapted from “Hard Sell: The Evolution of a Viagra Salesman” by Jamie Riedy.

Ambitious and even fearless at times, but noticeably lacking a sense of focus or real purpose, “Love and Other Drugs” is a good movie suffocated by an undisciplined mess of a screenplay. A good movie does exist within the framework of “Love & Other Drugs”, but there’s so much happening here that it quickly becomes difficult to find or identify just what we are supposed to be experiencing.

Set in the mid-1990′s, we meet Jamie Randall (Jake Gyllenhaal), who is selling as hard as anyone can at an electronics store. He has a natural charisma, wicked charm, and can convince anyone to buy virtually anything he wants them to. Jamie also recognizes that his ability to sell works in his social life and scoring with women is not exactly a challenge for the handsome young Jamie. With those looks and charms comes a youthful exuberance and shortsighted impulsiveness. Those reckless instincts lead Jamie straight to the unemployment line when he is caught…by his boss…with his boss’ girlfriend…at work.

Jamie turns to his wealthy brother Josh (Josh Gad) who sets him up with a job as a pharmaceutical rep trainee with Pfizer. Taken under the wing of the more experienced Bruce (Oliver Platt), Jamie stumbles around and fails to convince providers to offer Pfizer’s new medications Zithromax and Zoloft to their patients. Jamie learns that a quick wit and all the charm in the world is not nearly enough when it comes to making a dent in the cutthroat world of pharmaceutical sales.

In the midst of a sales pitch with Dr. Stan Knight (Hank Azaria), Jamie is ushered into an examination room where Dr. Knight is meeting Maggie (Hathaway). Maggie indicates that she is suffering from early onset Parkinson’s disease and Jamie rather crudely interjects a sales pitch for one of his medications. Prior to this, Maggie inquired about a personal issue and bared a breast for the doctor to check out with Jamie in the room. Later, putting it all togther, Maggie accosts Jamie outside the clinic realizing that Jamie is not the medical clinician he says he is.

But there’s a connection almost immediately and they impulsively sleep together. Initially, the terms of the relationship are physical with the mutual promise that if feelings start to develop, the relationship is to end immediately. Naturally, at some point the physical can only sustain itself so long and walls come down and stories are shared between Jamie and Maggie. They reach the crossroads – end things where they promised or open up to a deeper relationship.

Eventually, Jamie is tipped off to Viagra, a new drug which with Jamie’s womanizing past and lothario guile, seems to be a perfect fit. When Maggie starts seeing signs of a progression of her condition, the two young lovers who vowed no emotional connection are suddenly dealing with lots of them as decisions and sacrifices must be contemplated and considered.

The eternal question with “Love & Other Drugs” is whether you can like a film a lot and still find it poorly made and executed. That’s the paradox here. “Love & Other Drugs” has two great go-for-broke performances from Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway, who center the film with a uniquely engaging love story. They bare everything here, both literally and figuratively, and they seem to really believe in this material, perhaps even more than the screenwriters seemed to. Often when a film has a heavy-handed and overwrought screenplay, those tendencies tend to bleed over into the performances found on screen. Gyllenhaal and Hathaway trust their instincts and are in such control of Jamie and Maggie that when the film piles on the heavy-handed and viscous issues and melodrama in the second half, Gyllenhaal and Hathaway steer us through and make the movie about as palatable as possible.

The problems come in that problematic and exhausting second hour. Issue after issue and point after point and message after message are delivered with the subtlety of a hammer to the skull. Emotional moments have no real resonance, moments meant to have an impact are weak and transparent and the movie just tries to do way too much. Somewhere within “Love & Other Drugs” is an interesting and well-acted love story about two people who get through each day largely due to their talent in “selling” people thoughts, beliefs, and perceptions. Whether it is artwork, pharmaceuticals, hopes and dreams, or even themselves to a potential suitor, the interesting film exists there in those moments. It is a shame director Edward Zwick and his co-writers Charles Randolph and Marshall Herskovitz could not focus their attentions there.

Most damning to the film’s effectiveness is the badly misread and ill-conceived performance by Jamie’s brother, portrayed by Josh Gad. Gad looks to be tasked with providing sophomoric and juvenile comic relief in his scenes. Sadly, he just dominates every moment he is on screen, is a rather detestable creature, and throws the entire film’s timing off. The film’s missteps are not all his fault, but he certainly does not help or elevate the film in any conceivable way.

Love & Other Drugs” is a tough film to sit through if only because it has no clear focus on what it wants to do and/or be. A romantic comedy with a dramatic angle, a wacky screwball comedy, a message film about the pharmaceutical industry’s power and reckless disregard for the human condition, a steamy and sexually-charged love story with adult themes, a tender and moving romance where two lost souls simply seek the right person to finally grow up with – “Love & Other Drugs” tries to deliver on all of those things. Despite two great performances from Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway, it really doesn’t succeed at accomplishing any of them.

Should I See It?

For those who like more adult-oriented romantic comedies, this will serve of interest to you. It has frank and fairly honest depictions of a highly charged love affair and plays it more edgy than typical entries in this genre.

If you liked Gyllenhaal and Hathaway together in “Brokeback Mountain”, they restore much of the same chemistry they explored in that first film and really do deliver great work here.

NO

The film tries to cover a lot and thus, dilutes any actual impact the filmmakers were aiming for. As I said, a good movie exists here but it is exhausting trying to find it.

Some will be turned away and/or dismayed by the sexual content and nudity of its lead actors, especially if you are not expecting them to do work like this.

Josh Gad is dreadful in the film and probably still annoys me whenever you happen to be reading this.