Crush

Starring Andie MacDowell, Imelda Staunton, Anna Chancellor
Written and Directed by John McKay
website: www.sonyclassics.com

IN SHORT: Strictly for the ladies. [Rated R for sexuality and language. 115 minutes]

This is one of the few times, actually the only time we can remember taking the suggestion of the publicist assigned to the movie, and say that this chick flick is one best saved for a girl's night out.

Crush is, mostly, a chick flick about three friends, all of whom are 40 or 40 something. All of whom are available. Molly (Anna Chancellor) has been married three times and can't see anything but a negative outcome for any potential partnership for her or any of her friends; The eldest, Janine (Imelda Staunton), is a cop with a young adult son; Kate (Andie MacDowell) is the headmaster at a [private] school and the only American among these Brits.

All three gather weekly to compare horror stories of the singles dating world, drink red wine, munch on Tunnock's Caramel Wafer Biscuits and smoke like chimneys. And they wonder why they're single....

Tobacco consumption aside – this is a BritFlick after all and smoking is still cool on that side of the pond – Crush isn't so much about a crush, it's about lust and obsession and saying to hell with what your peers and friends tell you to do. It is Kate who is the focus of this film as her character carries the least baggage of the trio. Her friends are theorizing and/or nudging Kate in the direction of the local Minister, Gerald (Bill Paterson), a stable, respected and trusted single member of the Community. Kate, on the other hand, feels all sorts of Americana well up when the replacement organist at the local funeral home -- apparently funerals are a big gathering for this town, which should tell you a lot -- sports a pair of alligator skin boots. Jed (Kenny Doughty) is a former student who admits to a crush on the old girl. A quick fling turns into something more than a quick romp in the cemetery, to the embarrassment of Gerald (who thought he was getting somewhere) and the tch-tchíng of the wine guzzling pals.

Once this May - March relationship is established, Crush veers so far in a different direction that we can't even begin to hint at what happens, except that it shatters a long term set of bonds which may, or may not, be repaired by the end of the movie.

Brit slang gets in the way from time to time though we had no problem with the accents. Crush has no idea how to end itself -- those caramel cookies take center stage in the last scene, to the utter befuddlement of this male. If there is a secret language of women; men have their own code words and expressions so we're not dissing the other gender by making that assumption, Crush is screaming it to the hinterlands. OR it may be a Brit thing about cookies. We were utterly baffled and totally bored.

On average, a first run movie ticket will run you Ten Bucks. Were Cranky able to set his own price to Crush, he would have paid . . .

$4.00

Guys stay home.

	Click to buy films by Alan Parker
	Click to buy films starring Emily Watson
	Click to buy films starring Robert Carlyle

The Cranky Critic® is a Registered Trademark of, and his website is Copyright © 1995 - 2012 by Chuck Schwartz. Articles by Paul Fischer are Copyright © 1999 - 2006 Paul Fischer. All images, unless otherwise noted, are property of,©, ®, ™ their respective studios and are used by permission. All Rights Reserved. Not to be used or copied for any commercial purpose. Academy Award™(s) and Oscar®(s) are registered trademarks and service marks of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.