For some movies, watching the trailer is like seeing the entire movie in a two-minute-and-30-second version compilation of the best moments, with all the boring stuff edited out. "Bride Wars" is one of those.
As far as chick flicks go, it's not awful -- just utterly predictable. Anne Hathaway and Kate Hudson play two friends who have shared the childhood dream of holding their weddings at the Plaza Hotel in New York. But whoops, the über-powerful queen of wedding planners (Candice Bergen, apparently consigned to these old battle-ax roles now) accidentally books them on the same day, and neither will back down. So the BFFs become bridezillas from hell trying to sabotage each other's dream wedding.
The obvious solution is to have a joint wedding, of course, but we've got a movie to put on here, so out the window that goes.
There are clever bits, such as Hudson tinkering with Hathaway's tanning machine. The scene where she walks down a New York sidewalk, emerging from the crowd the color of a neon carrot, is priceless. As for the grooms, the movie mostly seems to forget they exist.
Inevitably, though, the movies takes a sappy turn as the comedy dries up and the tear ducts start flowing.
The extras are appallingly skimpy. There are three very brief deleted scenes, including an alternate opening. And a featurette titled "The Perfect White Dress" is nothing more than a 5-minute commercial for Vera Wang. Perhaps the product placement deal the studio struck with the dressmaker mirrored one of the funnier lines in the movie: "You don't alter a Vera Wang to fit you; you alter yourself to fit Vera Wang."
I guess in the real-life bride wars, integrity is the first thing to surrender.
Movie: 2.5 Yaps Extras: 1.5 Yaps