Made of Honour (12A) ***
3:05pm Friday 2nd May 2008
HOW soon is too soon when it comes to a remake? Two years? Five years? 10?
Made of Honour is a gender-reversed revamp of 1997 romantic comedy My Best Friend's Wedding, about a bed-hopping, commitment-shy 30-something who realises, almost too late, that he is in love with the only woman he hasn't slept with.
Invariably, this emotional lightning bolt strikes at the precise moment she is preparing to walk up the aisle... with another man.
Paul Weiland's film doesn't stray too far from the original, except perhaps for the climactic nuptials set against the breathtaking loch-side setting of Dunvegan Castle on the Isle of Skye.
Patrick Dempsey plies his natural charm to sidestep obvious shortcomings in the script and win our sympathy.
Luckily for him, his rival for the heroine's affections is devoid of personality and thinks the ultimate romantic gesture is a rousing chorus of the traditional song Love is Like a Rose.
Obscenely wealthy playboy Tom (Dempsey) ricochets from one fling to the next without any thoughts of commitment.
Best friend Hannah despairs at his bed-hopping, especially since she secretly loves him.
Realising Tom will never reciprocate her feelings, Hannah leaves for a six-week business trip to Scotland, where she falls for and agrees to marry Colin McMurray (Kevin McKidd).
During the trip, Tom realises that he cannot live without Hannah.
To add to Tom's woes, she asks him to be the maid of honour.
Made of Honour is as predictable as an unseemly scrabble for the bride's bouquet, intensifying Tom's misery until he is forced to tell Hannah: "I can't be your maid of honour. I can't give you away."
Fans of the leading man from Grey's Anatomy will undoubtedly swoon "I do" to every contrivance.
Everyone else should take Made of Honour with a generous pinch of confetti.
- See it at Empire, Odeon