Unforgettable

Year: 2017
Genre: Drama
Directed: Denise Di Novi
Stars: Rosario Dawson, Katherine Heigl, Geoff Stults, Cheryl Ladd, Whitney Cummings, Robert Wisdom, Isabella Kai Rice, Simon Kassianides, Jayson Blair, Alex Quijano, Marissa Morgan
Production: DiNovi Pictures

Unforgettable nips at the heels of an inconceivable yet still surprisingly common movie tradition. Movies like this seem to come out like clockwork every spring and fall, selling trashy love triangles, campy plot contrivances and flavorless counterfeit emotions masquerading as insights into the human psyche. I'm half tempted to keep this review as general as possible just so I can plug it in in perpetuity every time an Obsessed (2009) or a When the Bough Breaks (2016) or a The Perfect Guy (2015) rears its haughty, contemptuous head.

At least this one doesn't have Morris Chestnut in it!

But no, I will play nice, on the off chance that maybe someday one of these overwhelmingly crappy movies actually manages to reach the high bar set by Fatal Attraction (1987) - my God, Fatal Attraction is the high bar! And as much as I would like to say Unforgettable inches closer than most to being a passable dunderotica thriller, the fact is this movie may just be the worst of the bunch.

Rosario Dawson plays free spirit Julia Banks whose relationship with a former Investment banker turned California Brewer is high-and-away the best thing she has going for her. She has a job as a writer/editor I think but its obvious that's just an excuse for her to take lone baths in the middle of the day when the lights better. The only kink in her new relationship with...Mike, I wanna say it's Mike (Stults) is he constantly has to interact with his ex-wife, Tessa (Heigl) on account of their prissy little daughter (Rice). As the relationship gets more serious, Tessa sets out to make Julia's new life a living hell with the partial help of Julia's tumultuous past and a hacked iPhone.

I'm not crazy and neither am I!

The focus of our attention switches quixotically between the two women forcing the audience to choose sympathies between one character's milk-and-water niceness and the other's eye-twitching fastidiousness. Yet because of the laughable dialogue, the forced backstory and the awkward mish-mash of leering camera angles and lazy editing; having to choose between the two is like asking whether would would like to be bitten by a poisonous asp or smothered with a pillow.

Moments of Heigl plotting with the intensity of the nitrates in her wine flirt the line between reality and parody. She is hands down the best part of this movie mostly because the meta-text of her blubbering about being loved hints to the actresses own fall from grace, which (unfairly) pitted her against the Apatow frat-pack and the whole of entertainment media.

I'll show you "hard to deal with..."

This movie is unlikely to help her image, especially when the story forces her and Dawson to go from blandly cordial to Jerry Springer, "Hands-off-my-man-b***h," level craziness with the power of a single cut. It's all so painfully contrived too as literally every major plot-point can be undone if anyone bothered to confirm suspicions instead of letting them lie. I suppose if it helps the story, normal human interactions can be sacrificed, especially when the source of this love triangle has a penchant for excusing anyone's concerns with a hand-wave. Ex-wife gives the "how well do you really know her" speech; don't sweat it. Child gets a haircut as punishment; seems like normal behavior. girlfriend's abusive ex-lover winds up bloody on the kitchen floor; let's wait until we hear from all sides.

Seriously, this guy is not worth it!

Unforgettable's bogus lack of thrills, astonishingly idiotic characters and clumsily threaded plot-points are as basic and unnecessary as a Unicorn Frappuccino. All hopes for a stupidly sweet retooling of familiar cliches are dashed in favor of a sour monstrosity that basically announces you wasted your money. If a lesson can be learned here, its to never make your smartphone's password your birth-date; that and to never trust a woman who won't drink your own brewed beer.

And instead drinks this s**t

Final Grade: F