No Reservations (2007)

Director: Scott Hicks
Writer: Carol Fuchs, Sandra Nettelbeck
Cast: Cathrine Zeta-Jones, Aaron Eckhart, Abigail Breslin
Genre: Drama, Rom-Com

No Reservations introduces a new segment at this site. Aaron Eckhart joins Gerard Butler (The Bounty Hunter) and Alex O'Laughlin (The Back-Up Plan) on my list of actors unable to even have chemistry with their leading ladies in Rom-Coms. Then your acting really need some work, and I guess I'll have to put up a List of Shame, or something along those lines, along my Wall of Talent. Obviously I'm not coming to that conclusion only based on his performance here, as he wasn't much fun or sparkling at Love Happens either.

Kate (Zeta-Jones) is a successful workaholic chef at a local restaurant in NY, but she's got trust-issues, she doesn't deal well with people and her life pretty much consist of work and food in general. On their way to visit Kate, her sister and niece (Breslin) are in a accident. The sister dies, the girl survives, and without her father in the picture Kate is suddenly finding herself raising a nine year old on her own.

Everything changes, including her boss taking in a new chef (Eckhart) at work while she's taking forced time off dealing with her sister's death and her nieces arrival. From a decent enough premise for the genre, the story goes rapidly tumbling downhill from there. Zeta-Jones and Breslin have a nice enough chemistry, but Eckhart only manages to keep chemistry with Breslin and the rest of the kitchen staff. Opposite Kate everything feels forced. Adding a therapist in Kate's life and the neighbor, the cliches are piling up like dead bodies in a zombie movie.

Jenny Wade ("The Good Guys") have a small support role, which was nice to notice for a huge fan of that new TV-show. Breslin does well as the girl, I've seen Zeta-Jones a lot better and I'm not going to start on my Eckhart-rant again.