Total rating for "Just Wright" - 2 out of 5 stars.
This movie isn’t too hard. It isn’t too soft. But something about Just Wright isn’t right either. The drama is never intense enough to have you concerned about the characters. It’s never funny enough to be considered a romantic comedy.
Queen Latifah plays Leslie Wright, a physical therapist who’s working on fixing up her house. She takes in her knockout godsister (Paula Patton), who doesn’t have a job but has a goal: marry a pro basketball player. Leslie likes basketball too, but she’s a fan of the game, not the bling. They go to a Nets game, befriend star player Scott McKnight (Common) and get invited to his birthday party. One gets involved with Scott. Guess which one? The other one is the woman it’s obvious he should be with. Guess which one?
Queen Latifah is a beautiful woman, but because of her size, she isn’t always thought of as a sex symbol like some of her glamorous colleagues.She is exactly who should be playing Leslie, since the movie is all about overcoming the superficial. Sadly, she’s just kind of phoning it in. She has her moments (her glee after a romantic encounter is infectious and a very good scene), but they’ve made Leslie Wright into too much of a Ms. Wright. Seriously, there’s nothing wrong with her. She takes in her needy friend, she works with the sick, she has fun with her family, she clings to the memory of her dead grandpa… again, there’s nothing wrong with her.
The film casts her in such a perfect light it won’t even come out and say what I did about her size. I’ll say it again – she’s beautiful. But does the movie have to be afraid to say that’s why McKnight falls for her gorgeous friend first? When Leslie is on a date and the guy says he just wants to be friends, she nods with a knowing “Yeah, I’m sure you just want to be friends, I get it…” The implication: “I know I’m large, and I’m ok with it. You have the problem.” That is of course the right attitude to take, but if Leslie isn’t going to show us her insecurities, how can the audience ever doubt things will turn out just right?
The other two participants in the love triangle are just as bland and just as disappointing. Patton played the teacher in Precious, so we know she’s capable of some depth. There’s nothing to this character. She’s pretty vapid, which would be ok – but she doesn’t get nasty enough for us to hate her and she doesn’t act charming or funny enough to make us understand why Leslie would like her in the first place.
And Common? He’s quite… well... I hate to say: common. He’s forced to play a nice guy, and his forte has been as a tough guy in drama (American Gangster), sci-fi (Terminator Salvation) and comedy (Date Night). We may have finally seen him in the genre that doesn’t work for him.
Just Wright goes to great length to cover up the fact that Common probably isn’t an NBA-level basketball player. With one clichéd exception, we never see him make a shot. If you go, watch for that. He jumps, he takes the shot, then they cut away to show the swish. He’s never in the shot with the swish. He also dunks – but we never see him leave the ground. We see close-ups of player and basket. He does, however, dribble ok.
Actually, the basketball scenes are kind of odd. They take place in a packed Izod Center, but we never really hear the crowd. The characters are able to carry on conversations at normal conversational levels. A personal pet peeve: it’s always weird to see real life announcers on camera. For some reason, they can’t act like themselves. Marv Albert and Mike & Mike are clearly reading lines.
But then again, the sportscasters didn’t have great acting or writing to inspire them either. The blandness must be contagious.
Just Wright is really just… there.