#1 Cheap Two Weeks Notice (Full-Screen Edition) (Snap Case) Reviews
In 28 Days Sandra Bullock has 4 weeks to get through rehab and start to be funny. Here, she only has Two Weeks Notice, but the film is twice as funny in half the time. Hugh Grant is so charming that he was able to restart his career after he was caught with his pants down with Divine Brown. He made the Mea Culpa circuit on the talk shows, admitted his mistake with a boyish grin, and all was forgiven (though he probably still had a lot of 'splaining to do to his girlfriend Elizabeth Hurley). Anyway, oftentimes when I see a Hugh Grant or a Sandra Bullock film, I am very skeptical at first. Sometimes they are a bit much. But seeing them together, I bet that they would be fantastic. Each would balance out the other, or so I hoped.
Thankfully, I wasn't wrong. As far as the Romantic Comedy genre goes, it doesn't get any better than this. Their characters are opposites that attract, like Sam and Diane on Cheers. Hugh is a business man / Real Estate developer--kind of a Donald Trump with better hair and a British accent (BTW, Trump does a cameo and a Trump home is used for one of the locations). Grant is George Wade, a classic conservative, while Sandra plays Lucy Kelson, a liberal lawyer given to defending the poor downtrodden, and as a result, she is pretty poor and downtrodden her own self.
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Meryl Brooks: Come on, I've known you since Brownies, and the only time I ever saw you cry was when Bush won.
Lucy Kelson: Which one?
Meryl Brooks: Well, both of them.
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George Wade hires lady lawyers strictly for their looks. His brother tells him that has got to stop:
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Howard Wade: You need someone who can write a brief instead of removing yours.
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Seeing that Lucy is a bright lawyer, he offers her a lavish salary which she accepts. He is banking on the fact that they are really not each other's cup of tea, and so will not be distracted from the business at hand. All goes extremely well, but George begins to rely on Lucy more and more.
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Lucy Kelson: What did I tell you that defines an emergency?
George Wade: A large meteoroid, severe blood loss and uh... what was the other thing?
Lucy Kelson: Death! And you're not dead!
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It is at this juncture in time that Lucy gives George the Two Week Notice referred to in the title. She begins interviewing replacements, and none seem suitable, or even adequate, until in walks a bright young redhead fresh out of Harvard, June Carver (Alicia Witt). June moves in for the kill, and soon Lucy is feeling quite a bit jealous, realizing too late that she has fallen in love with the dashing and debonair George. June usurps her role and becomes his date for a charity function that he had originally invited Lucy to. June wears a top hat that is so Betsy's Wedding it isn't funny, or maybe it's a little funny, but it is mainly just very hot, a black top hat instead of a white one. For me, this was an unexpected treat. Alicia Witt is not only beautiful, she is smart, too. Intelligence, not power, is the ultimate aphrodisiac, my apologies to Henry Kissinger.
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June Carter: Do you know what I like even more than chess?
George Wade: Pokémon?
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Strip Chess? Wow. With Alicia Witt? What could be more tantalizing than that? Don't worry; it is all very tastefully done. But wait a minute; we are supposed to be in Kelson's corner. We are rooting for Lucy, not June. So Alicia Witt plays June as just a bit of a... well, you know.
Alicia Witt got her start in David Lynch's Dune, but I remember her as Cybill's daughter Zoey Woodbine on Cybill's sit com, Cybill. She was a smart and sassy redhead who played piano. In real life she was a classically trained pianist who used to play the piano at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel. She was also kind of a child prodigy. At the tender age of four she appeared on "That's Incredible!" (1980) to show off her amazing reading skills, and she also performed the balcony scene of Romeo and Juliet with the host. Her mother, Diane Witt, was in the Guinness Book of World Records from 1988 to 1996 for having the world's longest hair. One wonders if it was also red, and what a splendid sight that would make. Alicia herself modeled what is purported to be the most expensive hat ever made, the ,700,000 Chapeau d'Amour designed by Louis Mariette, at Christie's in London. Last time I saw her was as Miss Pasternak on 2 and a Half Men, where she was devastatingly cute, though her character was a little bit crazy.
Director Marc Lawrence is an expert at crafting Rom Com vehicles for either Hugh Grant or Sandra Bullock. He wrote Forces of Nature and Miss Congeniality, and he wrote and directed Two Weeks Notice, Music and Lyrics, and Did You Hear About the Morgans? Since he is so adept at creating and filming material for both Grant and Bullock, you'd expect a film with the two of them together to be a slam dunk. And it is.
Marc Lawrence has a good ear for music, and he even plays harmonica on the opening track, a re-mix of "Baby, You've Got What it Takes" performed by Dinah Washington & Brook Benton. Other featured musical performers include Counting Crows featuring Vanessa Carlton, Perry Como, Mel Tormé, Xavier Cugat, Fountains of Wayne, Aretha Franklin, Stanley Turrentine, James Brown, Bachman-Turner Overdrive, Michael Bublé, Norah Jones, Dusty Springfield, Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway, and Al Green. Norah Jones, doing the Hoagy Carmichael, Ned Washington chestnut "The Nearness of You" even performs her number in person. Other great musical moments were when Hugh Grant's character George Wade struts to "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," and when they repurposed Bachman-Turner Overdrive's "Takin' Care of Business" to mean the number 2 meaning of business.
Bottom Line is that Two Weeks Notice is a five-out-of-five star Romantic Comedy, and the material is perfect for both Hugh Grant and Sandra Bullock to work their particular brand of magic on. Added bonus is Alicia Witt, who really stirs things up. She can be my check mate, any day. It is a silly, frothy mixture, but it goes down so smooth and satisfying.
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George Wade: Divorce always gives me an appetite. Kabob?
Lucy Kelson: No thanks. I've never really warmed to the idea of a *flesh* popsicle.
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Did You Hear About the Morgans? (2009) (written & directed by Marc Lawrence) Hugh Grant was Paul Morgan
My Blueberry Nights (2007) Norah Jones was Elizabeth
Music and Lyrics (Widescreen Edition) (2007) (written by & directed by Marc Lawrence) Hugh Grant was Alex Fletcher
Playing Mona Lisa (2000) Alicia Witt was Claire Goldstein
Miss Congeniality (2000) (written by Marc Lawrence) Sandra Bullock was Gracie Hart
Forces of Nature (1999) (written by Marc Lawrence) Sandra Bullock was Sarah Lewis
Mr. Holland's Opus (1995) Alicia Witt was Gertrude Lang
The Thing Called Love (Director's Cut) (1993) Sandra Bullock was Linda Lue Linden
Bitter Moon (1992) Hugh Grant was Nigel
Dune (1984) (as Alicia Roanne Witt) Alicia Witt was Alia
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[talking about a leather belt]
George Wade: What do you think of this? Too ornate? Or do you think it's... beltacular.
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Two Weeks Notice (Full-Screen Edition) (Snap Case) Overview
Opposites don't just attract - they hilariously banter, fuss, feud and collide when SANDRA BULLOCK plays an activist lawyer and HUGH GRANT is the eccentric tycoon who hires her in this romantic-comedy romp from the writer of Miss Congeniality
DVD Features:
Additional Scenes:Two new scenes
Audio Commentary:Feature-length audio commentary with branching gags by Sandra Bullock, Hugh Grant and Writer Marc Lawrence
Documentary:Visit the stars, moviemakers and New York City with "HBO First Look: The Making of 'Two Weeks Notice'"
Filmographies:Cast/Director Film Highlights
Interactive Menus
Scene Access
Theatrical Trailer
