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Outside of it's trio of stars, Some Kind Of Beautiful has almost nothing going for it. The alleged "romantic comedy" stars Pierce Brosnan, Jessica Alba, and Salma Hayek. There's your hook: three well-known actors engaged in a fluffy love triangle. Director Tom Vaughan exercises little control over this farce, penned by rookie feature-film screenwriter Matthew Newman. In fact, Vaughan's 2012 Miley Cyrus vehicle So Undercover, itself no great moment in cinematic history, outclasses Beautiful quite handily. Joining in with a chorus of boos (the film hasn't been well received, generally speaking) is boring at best, downright mean at worst. But for this startlingly unfunny flick, it seems entirely justified.
Brosnan plays an oversexed college professor, Richard, who tries changing his womanizing ways after knocking up Kate (Alba). The pregnancy is a surprise to the couple as well as Kate's sister, Olivia (Hayek). Malcolm McDowell, all of ten years Brosnan's senior, is on-hand as Richard's crusty, profane dad—basically a trite 'grumpy old man' cliche. The entire production feels as if it was spit out by a piece of automated filmmaking software. It's soulless and, while competently assembled in terms of pure mechanics, carries an air of phoniness that suggests no one was especially emotionally invested.
When family life results in a transplant for Professor Richard from the U.K. to L.A., Beautiful gets brighter but it still feels unimaginative. Before long, Kate breaks the news to Richard that she's in love with surfer Brian (Ben McKenzie). Richard resolves to provide the best upbringing possible for their young son, Jake (Duncan Joiner, who is cute and unaffected—the only participant who walks away from the trainwreck with a full acquittal). Meanwhile, Richard gets something going with Olivia, but tedium has long set in by then. For a 99 minute film, Beautiful moves along at a leaden pace and I wouldn't blame anyone for bailing before it reaches its predictable finale.
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At least the Lionsgate Blu-ray presentation is reliably strong: the 1080p transfer is as crisp and detail as should be expected from a recent production. The audio is offered up as a lossless DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround mix, which basically sounds like a top-notch made-for-TV production (which the film basically was: it "opened" not in theaters, but on DirecTV). Incidentally, speaking of TV, the serviceable score was composed by Stephen Endelman, best known for his work on series including Made in Jersey (2012), Masters of the House (2011), and Happy Town (2010).
"Every good love story has three sides," reads the Blu-ray case. Okay. It might just as well have read "Every good action epic has a struggle between good and evil," which is equally irrelevant to Some Kind of Beautiful as the tagline they chose. Fans of Brosnan, Alba, and/or Hayek would do well to seek out their work in other films.
Brosnan plays an oversexed college professor, Richard, who tries changing his womanizing ways after knocking up Kate (Alba). The pregnancy is a surprise to the couple as well as Kate's sister, Olivia (Hayek). Malcolm McDowell, all of ten years Brosnan's senior, is on-hand as Richard's crusty, profane dad—basically a trite 'grumpy old man' cliche. The entire production feels as if it was spit out by a piece of automated filmmaking software. It's soulless and, while competently assembled in terms of pure mechanics, carries an air of phoniness that suggests no one was especially emotionally invested.
When family life results in a transplant for Professor Richard from the U.K. to L.A., Beautiful gets brighter but it still feels unimaginative. Before long, Kate breaks the news to Richard that she's in love with surfer Brian (Ben McKenzie). Richard resolves to provide the best upbringing possible for their young son, Jake (Duncan Joiner, who is cute and unaffected—the only participant who walks away from the trainwreck with a full acquittal). Meanwhile, Richard gets something going with Olivia, but tedium has long set in by then. For a 99 minute film, Beautiful moves along at a leaden pace and I wouldn't blame anyone for bailing before it reaches its predictable finale.
At least the Lionsgate Blu-ray presentation is reliably strong: the 1080p transfer is as crisp and detail as should be expected from a recent production. The audio is offered up as a lossless DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround mix, which basically sounds like a top-notch made-for-TV production (which the film basically was: it "opened" not in theaters, but on DirecTV). Incidentally, speaking of TV, the serviceable score was composed by Stephen Endelman, best known for his work on series including Made in Jersey (2012), Masters of the House (2011), and Happy Town (2010)."Every good love story has three sides," reads the Blu-ray case. Okay. It might just as well have read "Every good action epic has a struggle between good and evil," which is equally irrelevant to Some Kind of Beautiful as the tagline they chose. Fans of Brosnan, Alba, and/or Hayek would do well to seek out their work in other films.
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