Addicted to Love (film)

Addicted to Love is a 1997 American romantic comedy film directed by Griffin Dunne and starring Meg Ryan, Matthew Broderick, Tchéky Karyo, and Kelly Preston. Its title is based on Robert Palmer's song "Addicted to Love", a cover of which by Neneh Cherry is featured in the film.

For the 2010 Chinese film of the same name, see Liu Hao (director).

Addicted to Love
Theatrical release poster
Directed byGriffin Dunne
Produced byJeffrey Silver
Robert Newmyer
Written byRobert Gordon
Starring
Music byRachel Portman
CinematographyAndrew Dunn
Edited byElizabeth Kling
Production
company
Miramax Films
Outlaw Productions
Distributed byWarner Bros. Pictures
Release date
  • May 23, 1997 (1997-05-23)
Running time
100 minutes
CountryUnited States
Box office$34.7 million[1]

Plot

The story begins in a small town, where Sam (Matthew Broderick) works as an astronomer and enjoys an idyllic life with his childhood sweetheart Linda (Kelly Preston), who works as a school teacher. Linda wants more experiences than can be offered in their small town, and moves to New York City for what is promised to be a short amount of time to work a teaching fellowship. Instead of returning home, she forwards Sam a 'Dear John' letter stating that she is staying in New York. He leaves almost immediately for the city, convinced he can get her back.

Sam quickly discovers she's living with a new lover, the French restaurant owner Anton (Tchéky Karyo). Sam breaks into an abandoned building across from Anton's residence, and converts his astronomy equipment to surveillance equipment. He sets up house (and a camera obscura), watching her interactions with Anton in the hopes of finding out more information about the two, as well as predicting when the two will break up.

In his surveillance, Sam is later joined by Maggie (Meg Ryan), a photographer and motorcyclist, who is determined to get revenge on Anton, her ex-fiance. Sam takes a job at Anton's restaurant as a dishwasher in order to learn more about him, and the two men talk and become friends, Anton unaware of Sam's connection to Linda. Partnering with Maggie in the hopes of driving them apart, a comedy of errors ensues, in which Maggie and Sam try several unethical and nasty tricks to break apart the union of their respective former partners, including identity theft, assault, and getting Anton's restaurant shut down by bringing in cockroaches during a busy night.

Mutually hostile at first, Sam and Maggie eventually warm up to each other in their quest to break up Linda and Anton, complicating their original mission to win their former partners back.

Cast

Reception

Box office

The film, marking actor Griffin Dunne's directorial debut, was released on May 23, one week before the highly competitive Memorial Day weekend in the United States.

The film opened at No. 2 at the North American box office making US$11.4 million in its opening weekend, behind The Lost World: Jurassic Park.[2]

The film only managed to take $34,673,095 gross at the box office,[1] several million less than either Ryan[3] or Broderick's averages.[4]

Critical response

On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 55% based on reviews from 33 critics.[5] On Metacritic it has a score of 49% based on reviews from 19 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[6] Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade B on scale of A to F.[7]

Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert panned it as immature, implausible and imbecilic, but still gave it two stars out of a possible four.[8]

He did not go as far as the Los Angeles Times' Kevin Thomas, who called it creepy and said:

It is exceedingly difficult to find what's funny in the calculated, obsessive, relentless destruction of Anton, especially when he proves to be the most likable and mature of all four of these people. Maybe Addicted to Love might work as a pitch-dark comedy, but in the way Robert Gordon has written it and Griffin Dunne directed it, it gives us the impression that we're supposed to take drastic, irrational revenge as a larky laff riot.

Time Out New York film critic Andrew Johnston (critic) wrote: "Some say that movies named after hit songs always suck. In its own unspectacular way, Addicted to Love proves them wrong. Griffin Dunne's directorial debut is no artistic triumph, certainly, but it is a reasonably entertaining big-screen sitcom."[9]

In 2020, David Sims, film critic for The Atlantic called it "underrated" and "a personal favorite".[10]

Locations

While the majority of the filming took place where it was set, in the Greenwich Village area of New York City, some shooting was done in Centreville, Delaware and Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

References
  1. "Addicted to Love performance". The-Numbers.com. Archived from the original on August 21, 2003.
  2. "Comedy Movie Reviews | latest and classic comedies in review". comedymoviesreview.wordpress.com. Retrieved September 6, 2017.
  3. Meg Ryan performance Archived August 25, 2003, at the Wayback Machine from The-Numbers.com
  4. Matthew Broderick's performance Archived August 3, 2003, at the Wayback Machine from The-Numbers.com
  5. "Addicted to Love (1997)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved April 10, 2020.
  6. "Addicted to Love". Metacritic. Retrieved April 10, 2020.
  7. "ADDICTED TO LOVE (1997) B". CinemaScore. Archived from the original on December 20, 2018.
  8. Roger Ebert (May 23, 1997). "Addicted to Love Movie Review (1997)". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved September 6, 2017.
  9. Johnston, Andrew (May 29, 1997). "Addicted to Love". Time Out New York.
  10. Sims, David (April 10, 2020). "Unexpected Movie Masterpieces to Watch in Quarantine". The Atlantic.
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