Why you can trust GamesRadar+ Our experts review games, movies and tech over countless hours, so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about our reviews policy.
Pillow Talk, Lover Come Back, Send Me No Flowers... Classic Doris Day/Rock Hudson comedies that hark back to a golden age of Hollywood kitsch. It's easy to sneer at them now - - America's most wholesome blonde paired with Tinseltown's most closeted homosexual - - but, in the late '50s and early '60s, these ultra-glossy confections captivated jaded audiences with their high style, snappy repartee and eternally chaste romance.
Pitched halfway between tribute and parody, Down With Love expertly replicates the Technicolor excess of the Day/Hudson era. Costumes, sets and music drip with period atmosphere as process shots, back projections and split-screens revive a defunct cinematic vocabulary. And though Ewan McGregor and Renée Zellweger can only hope to emulate Doris and Rock's inimitable chemistry, they deftly pay homage with just the right amount of tongue-lodged-in-cheek. Far From Heaven attempted a similar balancing act, paying homage to the conventions of '50s melodrama while simultaneously subverting them. Down With Love, however, has no hidden agenda. Campy, ersatz and thoroughly escapist, it's as frothy as a cappuccino and just as insubstantial.
A fluffy, vibrant puff of nostalgia from the director of Bring It On. That said, unless you've seen the Day/Hudson comedies it imitates, you may wonder why he bothered.
