Starring Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal and directed by Edward Zwick (Legends of the Fall, thirtysomething), I expected it to be a romantic comedy that proved a little more exceptional than the others. But from what I saw, this doesn’t have the makings of a classic or a “generation definer.” The plot: Set in 1996, Jamie Randall (Gylleenhaal) is a rising Pfizer pharmaceutical sales rep who uses his “way” with women to help him rep Zoloft in doctor’s offices when he meets Maggie (Hathaway) in one said doctor’s office. The very first thing we learn about Maggie is that she has onset Parkinson’s. In short – she hates him, he lusts after her, they have sex, they try to keep having sex without attachment, they fail, they fall in love. What follows are mostly bad humming music as soundtrack, montages, cheap jokes, sex, nudity, tears, and more montages.  Oh, and also, his gross younger brother comes to live with him and is poised as “comic relief,” which makes for more awkward and drawn-out than comical scenes.

While most of the big reviews I read were less than favorable, they all seem to find some kind of “bright side” for the movie: Ebert thinks Zwick did the best he could with a bad script; most, including New York Times’ A.O. Scott, believe Hathaway did more with the character than the script called for; and Variety‘s Justin Chang says it sorta kinda works “if one can get past the calculation inherent in the drug-pushing-boy-meets-disease-stricken-girl setup.”

Maybe they’re all just a little bit more optimistic than I am, but I can’t even give the film that much credit. My bright side? Uh…Judy Greer was pretty funny? (As a receptionist Gylleenhaal seduced and then left in the dust.) And…honestly, not much else is coming to mind. Since the movie is so blunt, I feel no need to use pretty words or phrasing here: Love and Other Drugs is a bi-polar movie that can’t decide if it’s about casual sex, the evils of the pharmaceutical sales industry, or Parkinson’s. Can all of these be combined into one movie? Sure! If done correctly (see: not the way it was done here.) This film makes me wish there was another word not as overused as “formulaic,” but it really fits in this instance.

There’s no real development or investment in any of the characters. This is a true shame, honestly, given the two wonderful actors at the film’s disposal. Both the main characters feel conflicted because they have their own set of commitment issues. “Commitment issues” is just a phrase slapped onto the movie – not a lot of explanation or history required, just take it as it is. They have trouble committing but then they try to commit to one another. The whole story feels like one big cheap sell for the tearjerker ending (the ending that aches to be the next Jerry Maguire-scale ending), which then makes the Parkinson’s disease element feel more insulting and tasteless – as if it was just thrown into the pot for one big grand finale tasting.

I think Love and Others Drugs‘ biggest downfall is that it doesn’t live up to its own image of itself. It’s not as sexy, not as daring, certainly not as funny, and not as moving and deep as it seems to think it is. You know the one thing I took away from this movie? Sex. Lots and lots of sex. Everywhere sex. (And mostly in montages also.) Oh, and the throwing around of the word “pussy” by men whenever the film needed that extra oomph of “edginess.” All of that nudity and sexuality, and for what? Two undeveloped characters and a poorly thought-out story. No, it does not feel liberating or refreshing. I know it tried really hard, but in the end, Love and Other Drugs isn’t just a film about the complications of supposedly empty sex; it is empty sex.

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I watched it for the umpteenth time with my mother one night. The film deals with – to say the least – family troubles, so I thought she would appreciate it, or at least find it moving. Though she sat through the movie patiently, her final thoughts were: “It was just…weird. It made me uncomfortable.”

And really, that’s what’s so great about it. It’s uncomfortable. It’s so honest and anti-what-we-think-a-movie-should-be that it makes us uncomfortable. A majority of the people I know described the first thirty minutes as “slow…and weird…not a lot happens.” This is also (see, I told you I could do it) another reason why it’s great. Director Jonathan Demme takes the audience completely out of its element by making it feel as though you’re not even watching a movie, but rather, you’re watching all of these lives take place. And they’re laid out just as they are – all the fighting, the ugliness, the lack of communication, the resentment, and everything else that most families don’t want you to see. (Because that would be…uncomfortable.)

I read that Demme confessed somewhere that Rachel Getting Married was filmed with Dogme 95 in mind. For those who don’t know, Dogme 95 is – in short – a film movement initiated by Danish filmmakers Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg in 1995, with the intentions of stripping films of their “Hollywood.” (You can read the official rules  here.)

By its very nature, filmmaking is a deceptive and artificial process. And I don’t even mean in terms of story or characters – just the basics: lighting, sound, special effects, etc. These are some of the very things that von Trier and Vinterberg wanted to eliminate with the Dogme 95 movement. And why? To focus on one thing only: the story.

Thus, if you watch accredited Dogme 95 works, you’ll see that they’re very raw-looking. Jerky camera movements because it’s all hand-held, and no special lighting or fancy effects. But you can say one thing about them (or, most of them, since I’m personally not a fan of whatever “Julien Donkey Boy” is, for instance): You’re completely involved in the story and its characters.

Rachel Getting Married reminds me of an upscale Dogme 95 movie. They have a better camera, awesome set design and locations, and more well-known and acclaimed actors. But that doesn’t mean the essence of Dogme 95′s honesty isn’t there. There’s not much artificial lighting, most of it (if not all) appears to be hand-held camera, and overall the main focus is on the story and the characters. Not much else.

And both the story and the characters are heartbreaking, imperfect, conflicting, and contradictory. But they’re real. My favorite scene in Rachel Getting Married is when Anne Hathaway’s character, Kym, is spilling her guts out to her family. Kym made a horrible mistake that tore her family apart a few years ago, and she can’t seem to make anything right, or apologize enough. She asks, “Who do I have to be now?” This quote keeps popping into my head as I write this. Because what does film have to be now? What more can it be?

I believe we’re at a place in film where everything has been done. So many limits in technology, effects, and plots have been breached that maybe we can’t take it anymore. We still want creativity and entertainment, but maybe we want those things on smaller scales and budgets, and within realms that we recognize as our own. Maybe we want movies that don’t feel like movies, but like real life instead.

The mainstream public might not have noticed it ten years ago, but I think the Dogme 95 creators were really on to something here.