Hunky Matthew McConaughey plays a womanizing photographer who almost destroys his brother's wedding with his musings on the stupidity of love. Then three ghosts take him through his romantic past and he realizes he really is in love with bridesmaid Jennifer Garner. It's Scrooge with chest muscles, a vacuous trifle that doesn't quite rise to the level of disappointment.
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Garner
Rating: 2.5 stars out of 5
One of the danger signs in a movie is when the weather on screen -- in the case of Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, a snowy New England winter -- doesn't match the weather outside (sunny, with rainy periods). It means the film has been delayed past its ideal release date, in this case December, when its Christmas Carol theme would make more sense.
Another danger sign in a movie are the words, "Starring Matthew McConaughey."
Nevertheless, here we are, watching McConaughey in Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, a Dickens-inspired tale -- sort of Scrooge with chest muscles -- of a devilish womanizer named Conner Mead who is visited by three ghosts on the eve of his brother's wedding and learns that love and cuddling are more important than having sex with a lot of gorgeous models whom you never phone again. It's an important thing to know, although, come to think of it, it has nothing to do with Christmas, either. Maybe May is the perfect release date, after all.
Connor (MM himself, he of the twinkly eyes, firm pecs and amoral charm) is a fashion photographer who, in a strange twist of fate, is even more gorgeous than his models. We see him seducing women left and right and saving time by breaking up with old girlfriends on a conference call. ("I'm going to have to do this in bulk.")
Then it's off to the wedding of his brother Paul (Breckin Meyer) to Sandra (Lacey Chabert), a situation that Connor views with alarm and cynicism. Love is a myth, he tells everyone at the wedding party -- Connor Mead is in the running for Worst Best Man Ever -- and meant for the weak.
Things change when he meets the ghost of his late Uncle Wayne (Michael Douglas, looking exactly like the ghost of somebody's late Uncle Wayne), a ladies' man famous for his week-long orgies and the party where Dean Martin sang the Canadian national anthem in Spanish. This might be funnier if it was the American national anthem ("Jose can you see . . ."), but it's always nice to be mentioned.
It turns out that Uncle Wayne taught Connor everything he knows about being a jerk ("the power of a relationship lies with whoever cares less") and the three ghosts -- of girlfriends past, present and future -- show Connor he has been running away from his feelings for Jenny (Jennifer Garner, looking fetching if slightly long-jawed), his childhood sweetheart. Connor's problems seem to have started on the night when he was afraid to ask Jenny to dance at the school prom, causing a heartache that drove him to become, well, Matthew McConaughey. This is dubious psychology but very handy; anything deeper would just spoil things.
To care very much about this, you'd have to care whether Connor and Jenny will get together, but Ghosts of Girlfriends Past bangs around in such an empty artifice that you find yourself settling back into a sort of unchallenged numbness. Connor is so unlikely -- so removed from his feelings, so unaware, so impossible -- that nothing in the film feels remotely real.
Characters and jokes rattle around hopelessly, as wedding cakes and hearts are broken and repaired with equal facility. Since there's nothing at stake, you can distract yourself with the details of the wedding: the decor, the dresses, the structure of the toasts. It's pleasant enough, although it has very little to do with movie-going.
Ghosts of Girlfriends Pasts ends with a rare romantic-comedy exacta, the scared-straight redemption, combined with the race to the airport to save the wedding. Throw in the mandatory McConaughey-with-his-shirt-off scene, and you have the best Christmas-in-May movie of the season. God save us, everyone.
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