A watchable pastiche of A Christmas Carol, this rom-com resorts to corny slapstick a bit too often but also manages to find moments of real resonance
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05/28/09
Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (2009)
27
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:133
Fresh:36
Rotten:97
Average Rating:4.2/10
Consensus: A retread of A Christmas Carol, featuring Matthew McConaughey in a retread of his Dazed and Confused role, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past lacks originality, humor, and any semblance of charm.
Theatrical Release:01-05-2009
Synopsis: Celebrity photographer Connor Mead (MATTHEW McCONAUGHEY) loves freedom, fun and women...in that order. A committed bachelor with a no-strings policy, he thinks nothing of breaking up with multiple... [More]
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Garner, Michael Douglas, Breckin Meyer
Director: Mark Waters
Reviews for Ghosts of Girlfriends Past
Let's be clear: this is trash, not very funny and sometimes jaw-droppingly insulting.
05/12/09
The whole concept founders on McConaughey’s unalterable cheesiness. Flimsy though it is, the film has a couple of okay jokes, and might have been passable with a more endearing star.
05/07/09
Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol has been endlessly remade. None so far has been as bad as this unpleasant comedy.
05/07/09
There’s precious little to laugh at – not the lead’s one-dimensional swagger, Michael Douglas’s Rat Pack-meets-Robert Evans jive talk or an anti-misogyny parable with the gall to make every female a neurotic shrew or a sex-starved harpy.
05/01/09
Top CriticHow very dull it is to watch movies in which the men are lost little boys and women their sanctified saviours. It's demeaning to everyone.
05/01/09
Top CriticAny film starring the self-regarding, teak-veneered charisma vacuum that is Matthew McConaughey has more to overcome than most. So the fact that the rom-com Dickens riff Ghosts of Girlfriends Past is even sporadically entertaining is no mean feat.
05/01/09
Top CriticHow crass and joyless the whole business is, culminating in a love-declaration scene prefigured by McConaughey knocking an elderly man unconscious, to get the boring, obstructive old dude out of the way. Yikes.
05/01/09
Top CriticComfort zones don’t come much plusher than the one habitually occupied by Matthew McConaughey, who must read the words “arrogant, torso-flaunting alpha male” in script synopses and think: “That’ll do.”
05/01/09
Top CriticDirector Waters pulls out the odd cracker, injecting Dickens’ timeless story of redemption with a healthy dose of self-awareness.
05/01/09
As much as you’d love to hate it, this jaunty supernatural romcom remains a polished, amusing, surprisingly sweet diversion.
05/01/09
In the worst performance of his career, McConaughey plays Connor as so insufferable that Jenny would obviously be much better off with somebody else. Anybody else. Even Russell Brand.
05/01/09
Alas, it swiftly ditches the pithy asides as it hurtles towards its treacly ending.
05/01/09
McConaughey is so used to playing the rogue he has forgotten how to be likeable.
05/01/09
The film cuddles its Dickensian soft centre in a Mills & Boon soft casing. Où sont les wisecracks d’antan? Almost extinct.
05/01/09
There isn't an original thought in the film, but it bounds along amusingly.
05/01/09
Romance may be alive and well but the charming, well-made romantic comedy continues to look like an endangered species thanks to Ghosts Of Girlfriends Past.
05/01/09
Though it pours the sentiment on at its conclusion, Waters’s film has a nasty misogynist edge, suggesting that women are gasping for cads such as Connor to seduce them.
05/01/09
Enjoyable, well acted romcom that pushes all the right emotional buttons, though it's not as consistently funny as it should have been.
05/01/09
We end up with the expected platitudes on the importance of commitment, but the getting there is unusual, enjoyable and sporadically funny, enlivened by Waters' knowing way with genre conventions.
05/01/09
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April 30, 2009:
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March 22, 2009:
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