The Break Up - WARNING: This is NOT a romantic comedy 

Some actors get typecast pretty quickly. I think it's fair to say that Jenifer Aniston is one. She readily plays the loveable, kooky happy-go-lucky characters in a will they/won't they romantic relationship (and let's face it - they always do).

I don't normally watch romantic comedies. I find them predictable and identical (and rarely are any of them worthy of the `comedy' half of their labelled genre). I was curious about The Break Up because I heard it didn't subscribe to romantic comedies' formula. And there's a very good reason for this - that is because it's NOT a romantic comedy.

Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn get together in the opening montage and break up about fifteen minutes into the film. I knew this before I watched it. Therefore, what I expected, was roughly another seventy-five minutes of laughs as the two central protagonists make each other's lives hell.
However, what I got was simply two people being nasty to each other. Sadly, this is probably a lot more realistic than most rom-coms, and, upon watching it, I think I'd rather stick with the fantasy of boy meets girl and they live happily ever after.

The bottom line is that this film is more of a drama than a comedy - the jokes are few and far between. The scripted arguments may be accurate, but they're not that nice to keep watching. It's quite sexist too. Jenifer Aniston may be a bit uptight, but Vince Vaughn is a berk. The hardest thing to imagine is these two characters getting together in the first place and staying together long enough to even buy a house, let alone fight over who should keep it once they've split.

Bottom line - yes, it's more `real' than a romantic comedy, yet it has less comedic elements than even the most unfunny romantic comedy. It certainly doesn't stick to the rom-com genre. For the first time in my life I find myself saying `Pity.' 

6/10 May just keep you awake if Freddy Krueger was haunting your nights