by Lisa Hemsley

Created on: June 14, 2010   Last Updated: June 15, 2010

Iris Simkins is working for a British newspaper, she is still in love with her ex-boyfriend, but gets a massive shock when it is announced that he is now getting married. She ends up going home and crying for days, but salvation comes in the form of an email from Amanda Woods.

Amanda owns a company who makes film trailers in Los Angeles and she too is having problems with her love life and finds her boyfriend has been sleeping with his secretary, so she throws him out of the house. She too feels she needs a break and so sets about finding a holiday on the internet. Amanda comes across a website which advertises house swaps and she find the listing which Iris has posted.

Amanda and Iris agree to swap homes for 2 weeks with the hope that they can get over their lost loves and move on with their lives? Just what will their new countries have in stores for them both?

I have only given a very brief plot outline of this film and the storyline does really start to get going when the holidays begin but I just don’t want to spoil it for those who may not have seen this film yet.

This film is definitely aimed more towards the female market, because it is a romantic comedy and I have to say I loved it. The storyline was good although it was very predictable. I also found that we were seeing a lot more of Amanda and her holiday compared to Iris’s holiday, which I did not think was very fair as I like Kate Winslet as an actress and would like to have seen more of her in this film.

Cameron Diaz played the role of Amanda, who was a very hard woman at the start of the film and had not been able to cry since she was 15 years old. I think she played the part extremely well and came across well. I liked how she turned up in the snow in the middle of a country village wearing her heels and trying to drag her massive case in the snow to the house, this for me was very funny. She did start to change as the storyline went on and I think this was put across in a very good way. She had a good chemistry with Jude Law who featured in her holiday story and I think they both worked very well together.

As I said before, Kate Winslet played the role of Iris and she was a very sweet and naive person at the start of the film. I think she too gave a great performance but I would have liked to have seen slightly more of her. She worked very well with Jack Black and Eli Wallach who featured in her holiday story and I loved the chemistry between her and Eli who played an aging screen writer. She showed a lot of compassion in her role and I again loved watching her change and grow as the story moved on.

There were a few supporting actors in the film, but I have to say I loved the role which Jack English scenes were given. The scenery and sets were very good and looked very authentic. The music throughout the film was mixed, we had the loud lively tracks which were mainly featured in the Los Angeles scenes and the more classical tracks which were featured in the English scenes, this contrast in music worked very well.

There are no DVD features to mention, because this is a film only review. The running time of the film is 138 minutes and I think this is just a little too long and it could have been condensed slightly and none of the storyline would have been lost. The certificate on this film is 12A and I do agree with this rate. This film is available for just a few pounds on Amazon and EBay.

Overall, I am going to recommend this film as it has a lovely storyline which makes for an easy to watch romantic film with the added bits of comedy. 

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