Bounce (2000)
Grade: C
Cast: Ben Affleck, Gwyneth Paltrow, Alex D. Linz, Natascha Henstridge, and Jennifer Grey
Writer/Director: Don Roos
Rated PG-13 for thematic elements and mild language


With "Bounce," writer/director Don Roos has concocted a very frustrating film. A very long and tedious frustrating film. It has good intentions, but it falters in structure and execution. It deals with some heavy themes, but the script just wishes to pass them by instead of dealing with them and giving the actors time to shine in difficult roles. That's what Bounce is, a string of structural problems, script problems, and missed opportunities.

The Affleck/Paltrow vehicle focuses on Buddy (Affleck) and Abby (Paltrow). Abby is a woman who lost her husband in a plane crash a year ago. Buddy, is the guy who gave her husband the ticket to take his seat on the plane so he could have a midnight rendezvous with the attractive woman, Mimi (Henstridge) that he met at the airport bar. Buddy didn't know Abby's husband Greg, but all of the flights were backed up, and they just happened to meet each other. Greg, at the time, was an aspiring writer whose first play has just been closed and trashed by the critics. Mimi and Buddy invite him to sit with them, and they get to know each other. Buddy meanwhile, bribes his friend Janice (Grey), who works at the airport, to let Greg on the plane in his place.

At home, Abby is getting ready for her husband to arrive in the next two days. Not knowing that he got on the plane to go straight to Los Angeles (instead of Chicago, where he was supposed to go), she has no worries when she learns about the wreck. But through some checking and a visit from the airline officials, Abby learns the truth, and her grieving begins. She buys a dog for her two sons (to kind of fill the void left by their father), and no longer dates. Then, Buddy stolls into town to check up on them. He doesn't let Abbi know that these are his intentions, and through a series of meetings, he hires her has his ad agencies' realator and begins to fall in love with her...although the feeling is quite mutual.

"Bounce" has all of the elements to make a wonderfully entertaining romantic drama, but instead, Don Roos (writer/director of the 1998 Christina Ricci satire "The Opposite of Sex") prolongues the inevitable. We know that eventually Buddy will have to tell Abby that he was responsible for her husband getting on the plane, but it takes forever to get there. Yes, I admire that they wanted to establish the characters and relationship first, but they establish the budding attraction too many times. They constantly show Buddy and Abby doing things together (meeting for drinks, going to Dodger's games, taking a trip on an airplane so that her kids won't fear flying, just bumping into each other, him helping her with her real estate career).

The audience knows that they enjoy each other's company outside of just being friends. And when the big revelation occurs, it's through Mimi, not Buddy. Buddy, however, was going to tell her, but Mimi got to it first. Roos doesn't even show Abby watching the tape (that was taken at the airport by Mimi, showing that Greg and Buddy knew each other), and when Buddy comes by her house, she dismisses him without even listening to his side of the story. That was just a functional scene. It was a scene to make them break up so the audience would applaud, cheer, and cry with joy when the two get back together. To me, it felt fake. It fight like Abby had been going over this in her head and just came out and screamed at him to leave immediately.

But these dramatic scenes (or just that one) allow the actors to show their acting chops. Ben Affleck (who I have only liked in "Chasing Amy" and his bit part in "Boiler Room") doesn't single-handedly ruin the film this time. He employs his usual, cocky, pushed back shoulders stance and walks around like a macho man, but when it comes time to cry and to tell Abby's kids it's alright that their father is not around, he's solid. This is his best performance to date, and if he keeps choosing films like this that test his talent (unlike idiotic special effects flicks like Armageddon) then Hollywood may be able to make an actor out of him yet.

He is, however, blown off the screen by an actress I don't usually like: Gwyneth Paltrow. She was awful in "Hush" and last year's "The Talented Mr. Ripley," and I totally abhored the choice to name her best actress for "Shakespeare In Love" (that should have been Cate Blanchett's award for "Elizabeth"). But in Bounce, she is understated to great effect, and has really blossomed as an actress. Her emotional scenes are believeable, and her ability to make the audience care about Abby is impeccable.

All in all, "Bounce" isn't a bad film, just a long, boring film that takes to long to get to the stories' turning point. If you go to see it, you might be disappointed, but- like me- you won't hate it.


-Brian Jones, July 2002