Blu-ray Review: Baggage Claim

Blu-ray Reviews, Reviews

Paula Patton deserves better than Baggage Claim. She’s incredibly talented, charismatic and should’ve notched an Oscar nomination for the abysmal Precious over Mo’Nique. But sometimes you have to take roles to get by and a film like this, where she gets to be in the lead, makes sense on a number of levels.

Montana (Patton) is a flight attendant who’s younger sister just got engaged and she’s feeling the pressures of times. In her 30s, with time running out, she wants to be engaged as well by the time the wedding comes around. Using her job to get in touch with a number of her ex-boyfriends in “convenient” fashion, Montana wants to see if maybe she passed up on one when they could’ve been “the one” for her.

A quirky romantic comedy about trying to find true love, maybe even after it’s too late, this is a fairly innocuous comedy that doesn’t do much (and doesn’t promise much either). It’s mainly a vehicle to showcase Patton’s charisma and screen presence, nothing more, as this is a fairly perfunctory rom-com that doesn’t do much to stray outside the formula.

There’s no inherent risk in this film, either, as everything is nice and neat. Montana is a one note character, obsessed with finding “the one” after all these years, and we all know where this is going to lead in terms of character development.

The key to the film is that it would be profoundly awful if it wasn’t for the fact that Patton owns the screen. She’s easy on the eyes, of course, but she has a wonderful presence to her that radiates in the film. This feels like it would’ve been a film that could’ve made her career if it had been any decent. She carries to fairly mediocre heights, of course, as this is the exact sort of role to showcase everything she does well. It’s pretty awful when she’s not in it, a couple of steps removed from being a Tyler Perry level stinker, but when she’s on screen the film tries to be better because of her.

There’s a number of EPK-style features but nothing that gives insight into the film other than ‘everything was awesome.’

Fox Searchlight presents Baggage Claim. Written and Directed by David E Talbert. Starring Paula Patton, Adam Brody, Djimon Hounsou, Taye Diggs. Running time: 96 minutes. Rated PG-13. Released: February 11, 2014.