Is Gigli worth all the gnashing of teeth? Does it deserve to be excoriated by the press? No, not really. Is it a good film? Also no. Is it the worst movie of the year or of all time as some have declared? Definitely not. Gigli is a movie that has some good ideas but mostly manages to miss on the execution, leaving us a film that is occasionally good but usually feels awkward.
Larry Gigli (Ben Affleck) is a small time hood in LA, working as an enforcer for a mid-level boss Louis (Lenny Vito). He wants desperately to be thought of as the ultimate tough guy but nobody is buying it. His latest assignment is to kidnap the kid brother of a federal prosecutor in the hopes of getting said prosecutor to drop charges against an even higher ranking mob boss. Gigli quickly nabs the mentally handicapped kid Brian (Justin Bartha), only to discover he's been assigned a partner, Ricki (Jennifer Lopez), because Louis doesn't have much faith in Gigli. He is quickly taken with her charm and beauty and starts making his moves, only to be informed, no thank you, girls only.
Despite this barrier, they develop a relationship as she inexplicably finds him charming and he grows steadily more frustrated by her unavailability. Meanwhile, dancing in the corner to amuse all is Brian. His illness is never defined, which is convenient for the story because he can thus be funny or vaguely lucid depending on the demands of the scene. Bartha's performance is solid but the use of the character is unseemly. He generates most of the film's laughs but it is impossible to feel good about any of those laughs, coming at the expense of the character. The filmmakers seem painfully aware of that and attempt to slap a Band-Aid on it by piping in overly sappy music everytime Brian makes an appearance. The score is so cloying at times I felt a case of heartburn coming on from all the excess bile being churned up.
It's impossible at this point to consider the film without giving some thought to the excessively publicized romance between its stars. In wake of that, early buzz on the film was absolutely vicious. Don't believe the hype, this movie isn't anywhere near as bad as it's being portrayed. It's pretty obvious a lot of media types have an axe to grind and they're taking it out on this film. I wouldn't go so far as to recommend seeing the movie but neither would I mount the assassination tactics being leveled against it.
This is really a movie that needed a steadier hand at the controls. It is way too long, with the final act seeming to take approximately 15 hours to get around to its misbegotten ending. Possibly the film's worst element is the ending, which seems to suggest that homosexuality is just a passing fad, something that can be overcome for the right person. Tighter editing and tighter rein on the actors would have helped immensely. Did we really need several minutes of Affleck's obvious ad-libbing into a mirror? And couldn't we have had an ending that seemed even vaguely connected to reality? The picture seems to have no backbone, it can't support an idea or even a tone consistently across the length of the movie. It certainly has no logic. Why would this pair of mobsters insist on transporting their kidnapee around in a convertible in broad daylight? Shouldn't they consider closing the blinds in the apartment occasionally? Despite trying to hide a kid they seem remarkably unconcerned with his being spotted.
Not that the police seem concerned either. If not for the brief appearance of Christopher Walken as a deranged detectve, there would be no hint that anybody at all was worried about the kid's disappearance. If only they could have worked in a few more Walken scenes, I might have developed even the vaguest interest in the story. But at least we have a cameo from Al Pacino, chewing on the scenery like a Rotweiller with a soup bone.
Uneven is the best way to describe the movie. There are great scenes like one in which Lopez and Affleck debate whose genitals are the most desirable. Then there are other scenes of such unbelievable wretchedness I can feel my head starting to hurt. There was good material here, it just never got a chance to develop into something decent.
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