Crimes:
—
Casting the half-lidded, frozen-faced Paris Hilton as an idyllic beauty who
refuses to date any man until her hairy, dentally challenged friend Christine
Lakin finds love
—
Reducing "ugliness" to the kind of easily fixed cosmetic problems—a mole
here, an ingrown toenail there—that someone as beauty-conscious as
Hilton's character should've helped Lakin take care of years ago
—
Offering as a male romantic lead a dopey slacker (played by Joel David Moore)
who's really as much of a "nottie" as anyone else in the film
— Continually using the word "nottie" as though
it's an actual thing
Defender: Producer Hadeel Reda, recorded in one
commentary with screenwriter Heidi Ferrer, and in another with Moore and Lakin
(but not, notably, Paris Hilton)
Tone of commentary: Delusional. Moore says he
wouldn't have taken his role unless the characters in the film were "smart,"
which he apparently—and unaccountably—judged them to be. Completely
in thrall to the team-player spirit of Hollywood indies, Moore and Lakin praise
Ferrer's insights into the culture of the superficial, and talk at length about
their motivations from scene to scene. ("Does she know that I'm lying?" Moore
wonders, in all seriousness, about Hilton's character. "Does she care?") Reda
also oohs and aahs over Ferrer's comic genius. while making belated suggestions
for how the movie might've been even funnier. Her big idea is that when Hilton
says to Moore, "A life without orgasms is like a world without flowers," Moore
should've handed her a flower. (Ferrer politely agrees that would've been
neat.) And at one point, while Lakin's character is picking at her infected
toenail on a date, Reda has a moment of clarity and wonders, "Why didn't you
just cover your feet?" Isn't that the kind of question she should've asked
before they started shooting?
What went wrong: Again, delusions. Although
the tight 21-day shoot was plagued with paparazzi, that didn't distract the
cast and crew from making a movie they thought was really saying something about
how the world discriminates against the unfashionable. "A lot of people accused
us of being mean with this," Reda says. "But I think we're bringing to the
surface what really exists." And yet Reda still seems unduly enamored of
Hilton's beauty, and put off by Ferrer's suggestion that every woman feels like
Lakin sometimes. When Ferrer insists she drew from life, saying, "I did
exaggerate a lot of my personal flaws, like, I have a lot of trouble with hair
removal," Reda replies, "I didn't need to know that."
Comments on the cast: Though Hilton isn't
present, everyone still takes pains to praise her "compassion" and her "heart,"
and how they're glad she got to show a side that she hasn't shown in her other
films. "She's a girl's girl," says Ferrer. "She's a friend. I can believe that
she has lifelong friends, and I think it really plays." Reda thinks Hilton may
have drawn on her relationship with Nicole Richie, though she quickly adds,
"Not that Nicole is a nottie!" Moore, meanwhile, is in awe of the broad comic
business of Adam Kulbersh, who plays one of Lakin's reluctant suitors. "I love
all his little 'isms,'" Moore says. During the scene where Kulbersh pulls
Lakin's blackened toenail out of his mouth and then dives off a pier like a
panicked Daffy Duck, Moore says, "In this moment, Adam really shines."
Inevitable dash of pretension: Moore praises director Tom
Putnam—also conspicuously absent from the commentary—for having the
bright idea to film so many scenes near the ocean, which makes the movie "feel
cinematic." (Reda adds, "The beach, this lifestyle, is really a character in
the film.") And while much of the chatter in the commentary is about how the
movie urges viewers to look below the surface, that doesn't stop all concerned
from breathlessly ogling every hardbody on the screen. When Hilton is
introduced in a scene where she's jogging on the beach in slow motion, Lakin
and Reda have the following exchange:
Lakin: "It's like, all the popular kids in high school,
you know how they walk slow into the auditorium? I think Paris lives her life
in slow motion."
Reda: "I think the popular, beautiful people just learn
how to strut at a very early age."
Lakin: "They make their own wind, as Tyra Banks says."
Reda: "That's a nice visualization."
Lakin: "I think so."
The commentary in a nutshell: Lakin, describing how she
got into character, says, "We've all been a nottie at some point. And if you're
told you're a nottie your entire life, you might just keep on believing it into
your adulthood." Reda: "You start dressing in nottie clothes."