#40 The Hottie and the Nottie (Wes)

 

The Hottie and the Nottie

When I first looked at this list this was one of the movies I noticed that we had to watch and I’ve been dreading it ever since. I’ve been dreading watching it for the same reason that I’ve never watched the remake of The House of Wax. Paris Hilton. Was I wrong to assume that she has no acting ability just because her fame stems from being a wealthy socialite, with a sex tape and who’s failed career attempts rivals that of Richard Blackwood? Or is the fact that this movie is this far down the list total justification of that assumption?

Nate Cooper (Joel David Moore) is still obsessed with with his first crush Cristabel Abbott (Paris Hilton) who he hasn’t seen for years. He goes to California to track her down, where he meets with his old friend Arno (The Greg Wilson) who provides him with all the information on her he needs, including the fact that she’s still single. She has countless men after her, but she remains single in solidarity with her best friend June Phigg (Christine Lakin) who is so ugly she’s never had a boyfriend. Even though Nate and Christabel immediately hit it off, Cristabel says she can’t go on a date unless Nate finds June a date too. After several failed attempts, June meets Johann Wulrich (Johann Urb), a dentist and part time model, who sees Junes inner beauty and offers to help her with her external appearance. As Nate gets to know June he also starts to see the person that she is. Will Nate choose the Hottie or the Nottie? Is Johann the honourable man he seems? Will I ever recover from the trauma of having to watch Paris Hilton attempt to act?

Like so many movies and TV shows before, this movie is basically the story of The Ugly Duckling. From the Breakfast Club and The Faculty showing us there is beauty under that goth make up (why do they always assume goths are hiding their true beauty?), to the “amazing” transformations in Neighbours (“Plain Jane Super-brain” takes off her glasses, she’s beautiful, who’d have thunk it?), She’s All That (Rachel Leigh Cook takes off her glasses, she’s beautiful, who’d have thunk it?), Bette Davis going from spinster to chic in the classic Now, Voyager or the ultimate in make-over movies My Fair Lady (even Eggsy (Taron Egerton) knew this movie in Kingmen: The Secret Service, so don’t feel ashamed).

The difference being in those movies, the women were merely made out to be average and unnoticeable (or common in the case of My Fair Lady). With the right clothes, make up or just taking off those damn glasses these women too can attain the standard of beauty that Hollywood finds acceptable! The Hottie and the Nottie takes it to the extreme and makes June as ugly as they can, with bad skin, a mono-brow, bad teeth, halitosis, bad hair, bad nails and so on. Basically if they didn’t have to make her physically attractive by the end of the movie, they could have just auditioned the people who guest on The Jeremy Kyle Show and saved in make-up costs.

Of course to counter June as the Nottie, you have to have the Hottie. Again this relies solely on the fact that you think Paris Hilton is stunningly beautiful, which just isn’t the case for me, so the movie fails on this level. Unfortunately she clearly believes her own hype that she is something incredible and her vanity just oozes through in her performance. Hilton plays a similar role to the one Cameron Diaz played in There’s Something About Mary. But where Diaz gave a great performance that gave her character personality and heart (it also helps that the part was well written), Hilton’s acting range seems to extend to sitting, standing, talking (without emotion), walking, jogging and looking mildly flirtatious (Unfortunately if she’s required to perform more than one of these things at a time she has quite a lot of trouble).

As for the other actors in this movie, their performances weren’t dreadful. I liked Joel David Moore in Hatchet, and although he seems to be channelling Tom Green in this, his portrayal of Nate keeps this film above the level where you start biting on every tooth to see if you’re a mind-wiped, deep cover spy and one of them contains a hidden cyanide capsule. Christine Larkin gives an ok performance as June, but both struggle to make anything substantial from a script that was clearly an early draft from the infinite monkeys/infinite typewriters experiment.  

Ultimately this movie falls down on its own premise by the sheer fact that Nate had no interest in actually dating June until she’d had her hair and teeth and clothes etc sorted. Surely the point is that he should fall for someone despite her physical faults over the supposed hottie if this movie is to have any moral story. It also betrays the character of June. Sure Nate gave her a Valentines card out of pity when they were kids, but he showed no real interest in her until she had undergone her transformation, so why should she settle for someone so vacuous when throughout the movie she’s been so independent?

If this movie didn’t star Paris Hilton it would have probably have been a watchable movie on a rainy afternoon if there was nothing else to watch. Not really funny, not really likeable, but nothing wildly bad. However Paris really does take a very average movie and manage to make it unwatchable, as it was clearly a movie written with her in mind, and is ultimately just a big ego wank for her. If you want to see how bad this is for yourself, then be my guest, but my best advice is to avoid this movie as its definitely way more beast than beauty.