Movie Review

Something New

"Something New" takes the coveted spot of being this year's Valentine's Day romance, which I generally thought meant that it didn't have to try very hard to get people smiling and ready for chocolate by its end. Only this year prepare yourself for a special one - one that's far from the idiotic contrivances of flicks like "Hitch" and "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days," but that doesn't skip out on being just a sweet and lovable way to kill two hours with that special someone (or in my case, a hot dog and big gulp). And while this is basically your average chick-flick, it's a much better movie than most. Usually something like this includes sitting with the "sisterhood of traveling pants," staring blankly at the screen for two hours just "waiting to exhale," before leaving with great "pride and prejudice" that I got through it but could barely stand it. This one has some depth and intelligence, which is more than you can say for most flicks that come out at this time in the year.

Kenya McQueen (Sanaa Lathan) is the senior manager at an accounting firm where she is on the verge of making partner. She has almost everything under control, which may be why her love life is a mess. Kenya is an uptight control freak too busy coming up with lists to measure perfection than actually living her life. After spending another Valentine's Day alone, she takes some advice one of her friends got from a therapist - "let go, let flow." What she ends up flowing to is a blind-date with a white landscaper named Brian (Simon Baker), an all-around nice guy but who's white nonetheless. The date doesn't go very well but the two soon get a second chance when Kenya decides to hire him to fix her broken-down backyard. Brian then slowly edges his way into her life, encouraging her to lighten up and giving her the excitement her life is sorely missing. She feels herself falling for him but her mother (Alfre Woodard) is not happy about it and her brother (Donald Faison) goes as far as introducing her to his black businessman friend (Blair Underwood) in order to get her back on the "right" cultural side. The idea for this story is based on an article called "42.4%," which said that 42.4% of black women don't get married, especially if they make a lot of money.

"Something New" is set in the upper-class world where black characters are seen as doctors, managers, and businessmen able to advance in their careers, and seemingly exist on equal playing fields with the white characters. Director Sanaa Hamri gives the movie a decorative and lively overtone, using everything from bright colors to candlelight in an effort to make the movie look terrific. This is a movie in which every background looks completely gorgeous and it's hard to imagine it not trying to make a point with its decoration. The settings have changed, as have the situations of many black Americans, but the idea of prejudice is still around, only here in more of an indirect way. A white client of Kenya's seems reluctant to work with her out of fear that "she might make a mistake." Various instances in which Kenya shows off Brian for the first time lead to some jokes and several family members questioning Brian's motives for going out with her.

"Something New" was produced by Focus Features, the same studio that produced "Brokeback Mountain." The studio appears to be extending itself past the Kate Hudson "cutesy" romances we normally see and giving us things that look more substantial. The script by Kriss Turner follows the regular romantic comedy conventions but it is the maturity of the romance that really shines. Kenya and Brian each seem like fully-rounded characters, Kenya filled with understandable reservations about the romance branching from her job and family and Brian, being a character who at first seems bland, is so, but in a good way. He is a normal guy, blended with righteousness and his own shortcommings. He is blind to prejudice, but being a white male, he is also unaware of what prejudice feels like. That the two have a long way to go just to achieve a happy middle is evident, but what is pleasing about the script is that at times it can be funny (when Kenya first meets Brian, she is so terrified that her blind date has turned out to be a white guy, she immediately starts empathizing with every black character she sees in an effort to make it seem like she's not switching sides), while at other times serious (an argument in the super-market about empathy), but always feels important and conscious of the emotions of the characters.

The two leads can be given most of the credit for that as they both look fantastic together. Sanaa Lathan and Simon Baker each do star-making work here. Lathan captures the uptight but driven Kenya and Baker, though seemingly too good to be true sometimes, captures Brian's indifference toward race as well as his simplistic view of it. Both Baker and Lathan make this romance not just about trying to deal with race but also about real people who need each other, love each other, but who have some serious issues to iron out. "Something New" is not just surprisingly intelligent, but also a sweet Valentine worth checking out.

Craig's Grade: B+

A	10.9%
B	41.8%
C	31.8%
D	15.3%
F	0.3%