One for the Money Review: I For One, Want My Money Back

Did anyone really expect this to be any good? I suppose not, but, when your source material is a New York Times bestselling series, one would expect a little more care be taken with the adaptation for the big screen. One for the Money, based on the novel of the same name by Janet Evanovich, follows  Stephanie Plum (Katherine Heigl). Recently divorced, unemployed, and in need of cash, Plum decides, for whatever ungodly reason, to become a bounty hunter for her cousins bail bonds business. Just like that, her first case is to apprehend a cop who is also a murderer, whom she slept with in high school, or something.

There's some car chases, several gunshots, a few explosions, dialogue that I guess is suppose to come off as sexual, and a few arrests here and there. Have Katherine Heigl run around in high heels and a tank top, and you've got yourself a movie.

The film begins with a paltry attempt at recreating, for a more recreational audience, James Bond-like title cards, with Cee-Lo Green's "Love Gun" blasting in the background. It's an abhorrent concept at introducing a popular character for her big screen debut. Money is narrated by Plum, whose dialogue is somewhere between a bad Tina Fey knock-off and a late Elmore Leonard novel.

I think the biggest problem this film has is the lack of any effort to be grounded in reality. The draw of the book, and film I suppose, is that it centers around a woman with no experience in this field being thrown into it because of a desperate need for the big paydays that can come from the profession. But the issue with it is that the film doesn't even bother to try and give a remotely plausible scenario for this to happen. If the film started with Plum already a bounty hunter, working on small time criminals, and she finally gets her big case, that I could at least think, in some odd way, would be possible. But to have her first case be a murder suspect...it just doesn't make sense, even in a film like this.

I at first was excited to hear Heigl had taken this role; when I first heard about the movie, I was intrigued that she would be playing a character unlike many of her previous "I'm just here to be a pretty blonde" roles. Instead, what we get is "I'm just here to be a pretty brunette, but I shoot a gun, too". The choices she's taken with her career are disheartening. She showed some terrific range in Knocked Up, and became wildly popular on the hit show Grey's Anatomy. Since then, however, her career has taken a turn for the worst, and if she continues to make decisions such as these films, her movie career may be over before it ever had a chance to be anything remotely interesting.

If this series is going to continue (there are 18 books, after all), there needs to be a major overhaul in order to make the franchise successful. Directors and screenwriters who have churned out previous solid material is a must, and perhaps even some new lead actors. For now though, author Janet Evanovich must be feeling fairly embarrassed that her book franchise has been translated to the big screen with such a poor effort. 

Also, what is with all the hate for New Jersey lately? Between Jersey Shore and One for the Money, New Jerseyans must be feeling pretty hateful towards the rest of the country right now, and with good reason. The characters in Money can barely hold the accent, and when they do, it is a poor and almost insulting imitation. None of the people in the world this film creates are at all interesting. The city is lifeless, and contains no zest whatsoever. If this is an indication of the real New Jersey, then count me out of a visit.

D