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The Rebound
For a start, The Rebound has a very
misleading title. Rebound relationships are meant to be simple,
short-lived and superficial flings, without too much emotional
investment and way too much sex. In fact you could say that’s exactly
what a romantic comedy is – a distraction from bigger and better things.
The Rebound, on the other hand, tells the story of a relationship that
doesn’t conform to the predictable outcomes of a rebound and sticks its
toe over the average line in rom-com hierarchies with some genuinely
funny moments and originality.
Sandy and Aram are two individuals who find themselves hurt and
vulnerable after big divorces. Forty year old Sandy (Catherine
Zeta-Jones) finds herself in a new apartment with her two children,
looking for a new job in sports journalism and a new life away from her
cheating husband, while twenty-four year old Aram (Justin Bartha) is
abandoned by his French wife who simply got married to him as a means of
getting her hands on an American citizenship. Despite their efforts to
move on, the dating scene is unpromising and the pressures to find new
flings attack them from left, right and centre. But once Aram is hired
by Sandy to become a nanny for her children, their attraction for each
other soon fishes them out of blind dates and depression, and opens them
up to a unique love riddled with issues of age difference and
conflicting expectations.
With such a premise as this, I don’t think anyone could really expect
Oscar-quality performances. It is pretty evident throughout the film
where the strengths and weaknesses of each lead lies and this is
masterfully used to provide a well balanced dynamic between the two
actors so that neither of them draws attention to their flaws. Who knew
that opposites could attract when it came to bad acting? While Catherine
Zeta-Jones is more convincing than Justin Bartha in teary emotional
moments, Bartha’s oddly introverted charm in comedic moments hide
Zeta-Jones’ painful stabs at humour so that most of the film is
genuinely funny and entertaining rather than just plain awkward.
While this all sounds like a generic Hollywood rom-com, The Rebound
takes a major turn into seriousness and a surprisingly realistic take on
the fact that twentysomethings and fortysomethings are at very different
points in their lives. Compared to the first half of the film, which is
mainly centred around how weird Sandy’s children are and odd moments
involving vomit and rectal surgery, the second half of the film tries to
raise emotionally challenging obstacles that hinder Aram and Sandy from
just living happily ever after. What the film says about age difference
isn’t significantly thought-provoking or deep, but its attempts to
follow an original path sets it apart from most romantic films that
merely offer perfect and predictable ways of getting to a happy ending.
The Rebound isn’t a notable achievement in the romantic comedy genre,
but it is a small step towards better quality flicks. Like Sandy and
Aram, the film doesn’t conform to the pressures of being too predictable
and tries to incorporate both the light heartedness of a twentysomething
year old and the sentimentality you might find in a fortysomething year
old woman. So maybe the title wasn’t so misleading. Like a rebound, it
is a fling – short-lived and superficial – but it leaves good memories,
unlike most.
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