Baggage Claim

I am a sucker for a good romantic comedy. Sadly, Baggage Claim isn't it. It isn't for a lack of trying though, especially  Paula Patton who gives her role as lonesome, love starved flight attendant Montana her all, while demonstrating some strong comic timing. I just wish it was in a better movie.

As the film begins, Montana discovers her younger sister is getting married. Deciding she doesn't want to go stag to another family wedding, she decides she needs to find herself a man with marriage material. Her co-workers Sam (played by Adam Brody) and Gail (played by Jill Scott) suggest they use their connections with the airline to stage some run ins between her and some of her exes, on the premise that a previous Mr. Wrong may have matured into a Mr. Right.

The fatal flaw of the film is it is painfully obvious who she is going to wind up with at the end from the first scene he shows up on screen, robbing the film of any sense of suspense as we wait for her to figure it out. As she continues to fly all around the country, we wonder why she is continuing with this ridiculous mission when the guy she really wants, William (played by Derek Luke) lives across the hall. She even has a dream about him (and we don't know it's dream until she wakes up, another creaky plot device to throw on the pile). Still, she carries on even after she finds out William's current girlfriend is cheating on him (Of course she does!) 

The cast gives it their all to try and make the film work, but the problem is there are exactly zero surprises in the film and further hampered by flawed logic by their characters. Still the film does have a few decent laughs and plenty of male eye candy with Montana's former beaus (including Taye Diggs and Djimon Hounsou). It just would've been better if it had all been in a movie that wasn't so thoroughly mediocre.