French Kiss

Luc: Okay, so I try to understand. He tells you he has met this women - no, no, this "goddess". He breaks your heart, he...
Kate: Hurts me. Humbles me.
Luc: Humiliates you.
Kate: Humiliates me!
Luc: And so you come here to Paris so that he can do it again, but this time, right in your face.

Meg Ryan and Kevin Kline deliver hilarious and surprisingly touching performances in French Kiss. Ryan plays Kate, a seriously neurotic woman who takes the phrase "obsessive-compulsive" to new lows. Charlie (Timothy Hutton) is Kate's fiancee, an up-and-coming doctor who, when Kate is too afraid to board the airplane, takes a week-long business trip to Paris alone.

And there the games begin. Charlie unexpectedly falls for a French "goddess" and calls off his relationship with Kate. Stunned, our heroine becomes understandably obsessed with getting Charlie back, and the games begin. On her white-knuckled flight across the Atlantic, she encounters Luc (Kevin Kline), a smarmy French con-man trying to go straight. The two couldn't be less alike, but an unlikely romance begins to sprout.

French Kiss actually manages to make a decent statement about love and happiness, bringing to light the old adage, "There is no substitute for experience." The film is also believable despite its outlandish main characters, whom Ryan and Kline portray with wonderful emotion and with an amazing flair for comic timing. Kline's antics are simply hilarious to the point of absurdity. But with Meg Ryan acting in this atypical genre which she shines (remember When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle, You've Got Mail?), it will never go wrong - she is so super cute, always, and I am always her fan :)

The film's ending is pretty obvious, but how they get there is full of surprises, and it also reminds one of: Love really can come from the unlikeliest of places. It has a wonderful soundtrack too, in which the previous entry on Dream A Little Dream was one of them but not featured in the album - and a surprise recording by Kevin Kline.

Kate: And we had plans together, okay? We had plans for a home and a family. I would remind him of that, too.
Luc: He was obviously very attached to them.
Kate: And if all else failed...
Luc: You would get down on your knees and beg?
Kate: It's possible.
Luc: Oh no! Now I can see it: There is the "goddess", standing next to Charlie in her negligee, and you are there on your knees, begging. Poor Charlie - tough decision!