At the same time as incorrigible womanizer Jamie Randall (Jake Gyllenhaal) is learning how to be a good salesman for Pfizer, he’s also hitting on a 26-year-old Parkinson’s patient (Anne Hathaway) who is less than impressed. The filmmakers took Jamie Reidy’s non-fiction account of those days in the late 1990s when Viagra seduced the pharmaceutical business and turned that story into a strictly formulaic romantic comedy. A different approach might have been interesting, but this is nevertheless worth a look, with excellent performances by the two leads who really make us care for their characters.
2010-U.S. 112 min. Color. Directed by Edward Zwick. Screenplay: Charles Randolph, Edward Zwick, Marshall Herskovitz. Book: Jamie Reidy (“Hard Sell: The Evolution of a Viagra Salesman”). Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal (Jamie Randall), Anne Hathaway (Maggie Murdock), Oliver Platt (Bruce Winston), Hank Azaria, Josh Gad, Gabriel Macht… George Segal, Jill Clayburgh.
