SWEET HOME ALABAMA
A Southern-fried fashion designer creates a stir in Manhattan and
is proposed to by the mayor's yummy son. All that's standing in the
way of total bliss is the redneck husband the It Girl left behind
in Alabama.
(In stores 2-11)
CAST: Reese Witherspoon, Josh Lucas, Patrick Dempsey, Candice Bergen,
Mary Kay Place, Fred Ward, Jean Smart, Ethan Embry, Melanie Lynskey,
Courtney Gains, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Rhona Mitra, Nathan Lee Graham,
Sean Bridges
DIRECTOR: Andy Tennant
"'Sweet Home Alabama' is second-rate fluff with a first-rate star.
It's as preposterous and phony as a Confederate C-note, but Reese
Witherspoon has so much natural beauty, talent and charm she guarantees
more fun than the day the hogs ate Willie." -- Rex Reed, The New York
Observer
"Stereotyped and pandering, in a mealy Hollywood way, to dingbat notions
of New York City power-brokering and Deep South bubbahood? You bet,
darlin'... All of which would make 'Sweet Home Alabama' unbearable
were Witherspoon not such a genuinely attractive performer. Pinning
her easy, roll-with-the-punches performance between gestures of city
elegance and those of country spunk, the Nashville-born actress manages,
from time to time, to give Melanie (and, by extension, her two handsome
admirers) a dignity and autonomy the script itself doesn't know what
to do with." -- Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly
"If 'Sweet Home Alabama,' directed by Andy Tennant from a screenplay
by C. Jay Cox, has the ingredients for a classic screwball comedy,
the movie is in such a rush to entertain that it barely connects the
dots of its story. But it still has its effectively goofy comic moments."
--Stephen Holden, The New York Times
"Reese Witherspoon solidifies her position as America's Sweetheart
(in the process raising the unsettling question of whether Julia Roberts
and Meg Ryan are already dowager queens)...but 'Sweet Home Alabama'
is still thin gruel....Director Andy Tennant sets up a conflict between
cruel, shallow city slicksters and pure country folk, but his distaste
for the latter is so poorly disguised that the entire enterprise of
'Sweet Home Alabama' finally collapses in a heap of general contempt."
-- Ann Hornaday, The Washington Post
"...the combination of a wearily formulaic plot and an uneven comic
tone--which lurches from anemic sentimentality to lame slapstick to
(presumably) unintentional nastiness and back to sentimentality--would
be fatal for a would-be screwball comedy like this one. But Witherspoon
is such a delight--her comic timing so good, and her pixie-ish good
looks so fascinating --that she manages to make'Sweet Home Alabama'
seem charming and funny. It's only when you're leaving the theater
that her spell wears off and you realize just how bad the movie, directed
by Andy Tennant, really is." -- Jonathan Foreman, The New York Post
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