I can’t remember if I’ve ever seen this before, but I watched I Love Trouble last night – and indeed I did love it - well, nearly loved it, but certainly liked it. It’s a delightful comedy starring Nick Nolte and Julia Roberts as rival newspaper journalists who end up chasing a story far bigger than either of them could ever have imagined – and falling in love, of course, in the time-honoured tradition of such films.
At the beginning of the film the investigation is about a train crash, which initially looks to be due to human error – probably on the part of one of the servicing engineers. However, as more facts come to light, it seems that more is at stake here – particularly when continuing the investigation ends up being a life or death situation for the two investigators…
The characters are the reverse of each other - he (Peter Bracket – Nick Nolte) is a prize-winning journalist become columnist become novelist, who has become lazy and wants only to do book tours where he can ogle young starlets who are overcome with his fame and reputation. She (Sabrina Peterson – Julia Roberts) is quite new on the block and utterly determined to make her name. He is a slob; she a health freak. Yet despite their many differences they share a passion for newspaper writing, and the competition that sparks between them drives both to the point of obsession. At every stage they are trying to outsmart each other, while seeming to be buddying up. Neither seems to be able to get a clear lead however – for each symbolic victory one scores, they immediately find a symbolic loss to even it out.
One thing that makes the film work so well is that both main characters are that curious mix of likeable and dislikable, meaning that you like good things happening to them but still find it funny when bad things happen to them. Nolte and Roberts are both excellent in their roles and have excellent chemistry together – whether they love or hate each other at the time. The supporting cast is great, with Saul Rubinbrek, Eugene Levy, and Robert Loggia among others putting in good performances.
Unlike many others (from reading reviews here and on other sites), I think the scriptwriters did a good job. A comedy thriller has to work both as a comedy and a thriller to be a good film, and for me this film manages both. There are plenty of funny moments, some very funny, and the plot keeps you guessing most of the way. It does occasionally suffer from being a bit predictable it’s true, and the comedy element isn’t always great – but both are on the mark more often than not. One or two moments do seem somewhat preposterous but I took them for stealth comedy elements, which is perhaps why I liked this more than other people did. Peter did seem rather too old for Sabrina to me (Nolte is Roberts’ senior by 26 years), though that did fit in with his being an established newspaper legend while she was making her name.
At 123 minutes it didn’t seem too long to me. There was plenty of action and plenty of laughs, and the ending was good. Overall I really liked it, I almost considered giving it 5 stars but it just wasn’t quite that good. The musical score was a lot of fun and compliments things nicely, and overall this is an enjoyable movie as long as you don’t analyse it too much. Not particularly memorable perhaps, but enjoyably relaxing and amusing viewing.
Rating: PG (There isn’t much in the way of offensive content in this movie, some things are hinted at and a little bit of bad language but that’s it.
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