Fool's Gold

 (2008)

by Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski)

Fool's Gold is a film in which Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson, as ex-spouses, hunt for sunken Spanish treasure while they bicker and flirt and bicker and fall in love all over again. How much of a review do you need? Everything that you would expect to happen does happen in the exact order in which you would expect it, with one exception. For some reason, there are no sharks.

This sort of adventure/rom-com can be fun if two things happen: (1) the script maintains a fast pace; (2)  the supporting players provide entertainment along the way. I regret to report that neither is true here:

• The last third of the film moves along swiftly, but before that the script is bogged down in unnecessary details about why the Spanish treasure is not where people think it is. These picayune details are laid out to the point where I was confused. In fact, I was relieved to see that the film's protagonists were also confused, despite having spent their entire adult lives researching nothing but this very narrow subject.

• Matthew and Kate are the best elements of the film. The supporting cast engaged in a rather curious contest to see which of them could play the least credible character. Ewen Bremner, a Scot, talked with a cartoon Ukrainian accent.  Canadian Donald Sutherland talked with some kind of stuffy pseudo-English accent which would not have passed muster in a high school play. Alexis Dziena did an exaggerated impersonation of Paris Hilton's Valspeak, as if Paris needed exaggeration. Kevin Hart, as the alleged heavy, did a grade-B Chris Tucker imitation, except less masculine. The award for the silliest characterization of all went to Ray Winstone, who made an absolutely ludicrous attempt at some kind of southern American drawl, which ended up sounding like a high school A.V. kid from New England trying to mimic Foghorn Leghorn during the lunch hour cartoons.  Those five people didn't even try to raise their performances above the level of the usual stock characterizations from cheesy old TV sitcoms. If Larry Storch and Huntz Hall could have time-traveled into this movie, they would have been the subtlest character actors.

As for the stars ... well, they did what they always do. His shirtlessness played the laid-back aging surfer with impeccable abs and pecs, and Hudson played the challenging role of Kate Hudson. The film was a mini-hit because a lot of people like that combination. If you are among them, go for it.

NUDITY REPORT

The only nudity came from two bit players named Clementine Heath and Ashley Cheadle, who flashed McConaughey from a passing boat.

THE CRITICS AND ACADEMIES

THE BOX OFFICE

Box Office Mojo. A mini-hit, it took in $21 million on its opening weekend (first place) and a very respectable $13 million the following week. the final tally was $70m. That was solid, but a minor disappointment in that the budget was $70 million and the previous teaming of the stars passed $100 million.