Marital strife

What is it about planning a wedding that makes women crazy? It could be that society has been telling them their whole lives that this is the most important day they’ll ever have. It could be that every girl wants a perfect wedding. It could be that spending that much time, effort and money preparing for a single day is very stressful.

Liv and Emma (Kate Hudson and Anne Hathaway, respectively) have been best friends all their lives.

Since witnessing a wedding at the Plaza Hotel as children, both have been planning a June wedding at this dream location. When they are proposed to within a day of each other, they decide to meet the most famous wedding planer in New York together. But their über-planner’s secretary fouls up the works when she schedules both weddings on the same day, at the same time.

Even though they’ve promised each other not to do anything until the problem is resolved, both are intent on the Plaza and begin making arrangements for the perfect wedding. Things turn snarky during a joint shower when Liv threatens Emma’s wedding. Emma reminds Liv that an enlarging backside is always threatening to keep her from the perfect Vera Wang dress.

This begs the question: What is more important, keeping a lifetime friendship or having your wedding at the Plaza? Since the wedding is a single day, and the friendship has lasted two decades, the answer would appear obvious. But then the movie would have been a lot shorter and far less funny.

Everything culminates on a wedding day that neither will ever forget but is laughably far from the dream weddings they’d envisioned.

Some of the film is very funny although there were a few slow spots. However, it was nice to see a film that wasn’t overflowing with sex and violence. Bride Wars tells an entertaining story without resorting to these cheap visual tactics. For a romantic comedy, it’s pretty good, although it would be nice if weddings were seen simply as events rather a woman’s reason for living.