Just Like Heaven [DVD] [2005] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]

The plot is simple:

Witherspoon plays a Elizabeth Masterson, a doctor who's a workaholic. On her way home one day she is involved in an accident.

David (Ruffalo) rents an apartment. One evening Elizabeth appears and starts telling him to get out of her apartment. At first he thinks he's imagining things but then realises she's a ghost -- the question is will she accept that?

The film starts off funny but, as it progresses, it gets sweeter. He spends his time trying to straighten out the mess they're both in whilst trying to convince the people around him that he's not going crazy (he's the only one who can see her).

I love supernatural romance and this is one of the better films in that genre. The characters are believable and the development of both plot and characters is well handled. There are one or two silly scenes in the name of comedy but they are, fortunately, not many.

Certain scenes had me in fits of laughter. I've never seen this comedic side to Mark Ruffalo before and it's great!! Reese Witherspoon is a great actress as usual with her charisma and they make a wonderful couple. Mark steals most of the show with a lot of his scenes and I love his ability to potray many emotions with his facial expression and body language and shows a soft side to a man, which is very appealing. At one point he had to cry and you know how sometimes actors and actresses have to cry and they just can't and if they do, they make the noise and facial expression but no tears come down .. well, Mark's eyes got red, welled up and he really cried and I felt his emotions - he was really crying and that wasn't no acting - if it was acting, he was GOOD!

For me, it's an extremely funny movie and it's one of those movies where I didn't know the story and couldn't figure it out (you know some movies you just know what's going to happen) - whereas with this ... certain things happened and I was totally caught by suprise, going oh my gawd ... I never saw that coming, which kept the interest up as I just didn't know what was going to happen; and when it did, it was hilarious a lot of the time.

This is definitely a keeper for me and something to watch over and over! I almost couldn't watch it as it's a Region 1 NTSC DVD and my 2 normal DVD players couldn't read it but luckily my portable DVD player did (whew!).

Overly cute, awkwardly acted, and full of the usual minor misunderstandings designed to keep the lovers apart, Just Like Heaven revolves around the lively spirit of a comatose doctor who spars and bonds with the wounded and dissolute hunk who moves into her apartment. A perfectly hospitable and undemanding genre film, the movie endures a rocky start, and then catches fire with some smart, enjoyable if unsophisticated wit, before eventually fizzling out in a mostly sugary final act.

Dr. Elizabeth Masterson is an overworked and dedicated San Francisco emergency room doctor. On her way to a blind date dinner arranged by her sister, huge truck collides with her car during a rainstorm, leading Elizabeth's sister (Dina Waters) to sublet Elizabeth's choice apartment, complete with stunning million dollar views and a fireplace in a vintage hillside corner building.

Meanwhile, moping landscape architect David (Mark Ruffalo) in his search for an apartment, unable to shake off the death of his wife two years earlier despite the best efforts of his therapist pal (Donal Logue), is so taken with the attractive apartment that he snaps it up, intent on drinking himself into a stupor and wallowing in despair, is shocked when the image of Elizabeth soon appears.

Both demand to know what each other are doing in their place. David realizes that only he can see Elizabeth, who is unaccountably hard to convince that she is actually a ghost. After a couple such run-ins, David first tries to exorcise Elizabeth, and then recruits a supernatural bookstore clerk, Darryl (Jon Heder), in an effort to help Elizabeth become incarnate. Some identity sleuthing, acerbic teasing, and a common attraction ensue, and when the pair discovers that Elizabeth is about to be taken off of life support, they both race against time to stop it.

Adapted from the novel If Only It Were True, the film just tries too hard, especially during the awkward third act where the wounded couple's path to spiritual redemption is tempered by a phony right to life diatribe. The biggest problem, however, is the weak screenplay, which tries to make Witherspoon's squinty doe eyed Elizabeth into one long running joke which most of the time, falls terribly flat. Given the lack of sweeping, dramatically lyrical romance present in either the script or the characterizations, the movie would have benefited from a more raucous and freewheeling application of its premise. Instead, the director Mark Waters and the lead actors play it all terribly safe.

Witherspoon is glowing as always, if not a little overly earnest, and Ruffalo is good in all his sexy gruffness, but there’s no real spark of robust chemistry here, the arc of their bourgeoning relationship is all fairly perfunctory, and it's just not heavy enough to make the metaphysicality of this concept really mean something. The film as a whole, while amicable and approachable, seems tamped down by a litany of corny music cues and the predictable plotting.

I guess you could say that Just Like Heaven gets by on the likeability of its two stars, but it has more fits than starts, and the basic comedic opportunities just don't really work; it's premise is just too tired; perhaps with a stronger script, and a more tightly focused direction, the film might have been quite compelling. You have to worry about a film when you end up admiring the gorgeous apartment furnishings and the stunning vistas far more than the actual story or characters. Mike Leonard February 06.