Hello everyone, I am Natsuko. This is my first movie review here and I am going to start with, “Flirting with Forty”. I wanted to start with a kind of movie I usually watch for fun.

As you may already have noticed, this movie is one of those romantic comedy movies, maybe some of you call these “Chick-flicks”. These types of movie might not be so attractive or so fascinating for some of you.  But well, personally, I like this type of movie, just for a Friday night relaxing time.

Plot

Main character, Jackie, is a 40 year old, recently divorced mother. She has a teenage son and a younger sister, and since they planned to spend a vacation with their father, Jackie decided to go to Hawaii. And of course, she meets a tanned, sexy-looking surfing instructor guy who is only 27 years old, and have some fun as a one-night stand. Although they just hooked up several times, it turned into love, and she starts going to Hawaii quite often. However, her ex-husband, her kids, and even her best friends became unhappy about her long distance relationship with a really young guy, and Jackie decides to break up with him.

…Story does not end here, but I will stop writing plot because I do not want to spoil everything in case some of you want to watch this movie.

Interesting Points

This movie was interesting for me in a sense that the situation of this family is really a realistic one in the United States or in Japan today. Divorced couple with kids, working mother, or ex-husband’s current girlfriend gets close to her children. Also, people are sometimes in a long distance relationships. So, even though audiences know that this is an unrealistic “rom-com” movie, there are some kinds of real in this situation.

Another interesting point in this movie was when one of Jackie’s best friends said,

“Maybe if you are a guy dating 27 years old, then we would not tell you to stop dating her.”

This was a comment that made me think about some things. When do you hear this quote, how do you feel? I was a little surprised because more than 50% of my brain was agreeing to this opinion. Is there even a movie if this is about a divorced guy who started dating a twenty-something? This is a movie because the older one is the lady and it is somewhat “unique” I thought. I did not think I was a sexist, but I realized that sometimes I have a different attitude towards different gender, even if they are doing the same thing. Also, this made me think about the question “How much of an age difference is too much in a relationship?”.

Comments

I have to admit, this was not the best movie, not even the best romantic comedy movie. There were not so may happenings, and story line is only about her love life. It was a little flat. But, you might find yourself enjoying this movie with a glass of wine on Friday night at home, alone. If you are interested in it,  I recommend you to watch it when you do not want any adventure or horror and you just want to have a calm, relaxing night.

See you next time!