Review: Sweet Home Alabama

Melanie (Witherspoon): What are you doing here?
Andrew (Dempsey): Getting my woman, that is if you still want me.
Teenage Girl in the Audience: Oh my god!
Audience: (Laughs their wits out).

Sweet Home Alabama works. After the terrible Swimfan, I was really searching for some good material that still qualified as a teen-flick, and I found it. With its light jokes that dish out an amusing experience and widely appealing personality; this is a keeper. Today’s teenage genre is so one dimensional, and delivers what it promises every time; this film is surprisingly different. It is the most unique comedy since Witherspoon’s last effort, Legally Blonde.

The storyline is recycled, but works with the actors different strong points well. As the story goes, Melanie, a southern scrap turned New York City fashion designer is proposed to by the senator of New York’s son. Instead of picking her out a ring himself, he proposes inside of Tiffany’s and lets her choose her own. She is ready to get married right away; the only trouble is that she has some unfinished business that needs tending to before the wedding back in her home state, Alabama. As the plot moves forward, we find that she never officially divorced her previous marriage that still lives in her home town. She sent him divorce papers several times, but he always would send them back without a signature. She must march down south herself and ask him in person! She confronts him angrily when she gets to his house, but he still won’t sign. She is firm and rigid in getting him to do so, but after spending a while in her old town she becomes more in touch with her roots, and the love that once lived with her old relationship starts to fly once again. This new guy isn’t going to be as easy to marry as she thought…

With the information the trailer shows, and that of which I have just given you; the story must sound as predictable as anything ever made before in history. I had the same thoughts before I saw the movie too, but I was wrong. The movie doesn’t sound very deep, but the controversy that Witherspoon’s character’s emotions go through is actually a tremendously profound looking struggle when it is put on to film. At times, the light jokes will just fade away and you will even start to take the material seriously due to her extreme versatility.

Mrs. Witherspoon is about the most marketable actress around at the time. She can put out any material and still be liked. She is being paid fifteen million dollars to do a sequel to Legally Blonde, entitled Red, White, and Blonde, where the infamous Elle Woods continues her study of law and defends some of the nations biggest convicts. Everything puts out in this flick is incredibly silly, but it works tremendously. Professional box-office predictors are saying that the movie will make thirty million dollars in its first week; that’s a hell of a lot of money for a post-summer release.

Sweet Home Alabama breezes through a simple, but flawless execution of its light, but heartfelt material. Reese Witherspoon is great as the comically mixed-up Melanie. This is one movie that really works: substance wise and finance wise. If you’re looking for something light and easy going that can be enjoyed by everyone; Sweet Home Alabama is definitely the right pick. I deem it worthy of 3 ½ out of 4 buckets.

-Danny, Bucket Reviews