This Means War | Film review

We’ve come to expect obsessive behavior in romantic comedies, but This Means War pushes the stalker factor to a new level. Neurotic career woman Lauren (Reese Witherspoon) finds herself torn between two suitors: cocksure lady-killer FDR (Chris Pine) and sensitive single dad Tuck (Tom Hardy). Unbeknownst to her, both men are secret agents—partners, in fact—and they’re engaged in a friendly competition for her affections. As the contest heats up, jealousies flare and tactics escalate. Soon FDR and Tuck are running background checks on Lauren, breaking into her apartment on reconnaissance missions and—in a particularly skin-crawling development—using surveillance equipment to spy on each other during hot-and-heavy dates. Can you file a restraining order against the CIA?

Set aside its fundamental creepiness, and This Means War is still a formulaic fusion of romcom convention and perfunctory spy-versus-spy shtick. Part of the problem is the script, which boasts such tired staples as the saucy best friend (a barn-door-broad Chelsea Handler) and such contrivances as Lauren making out with FDR, whom she initially loathes, just to make a passing ex-boyfriend jealous. Blame the rest on the former Charlie’s Angels helmer. McG’s action sequences are choppy and cartoonish, while the CIA headquarters would look more at home in Spy Kids.

What can the photogenic stars do but default to their strengths? Witherspoon scrunches her nose, Pine revives his smarmy Captain Kirk routine, and Hardy—new to date-movie schlock—leans hard on his smoldering Britishness. Their love triangle would be cute if it weren’t so synthetic—and icky.