Verdict
Summary
A very delightfully ’80s romantic comedy with a twist, Making Mr. Right has a decidedly feminine approach to it, and its director Susan Seidelman (Desperately Seeking Susan) infuses the film with style and verve.
Plot:
A PR executive gets the opportunity to do a PR campaign for the world’s first humanoid android, but she ends up falling in love with it!
Review:
After falling for a deadbeat local politician she did a PR campaign for, attractive and “with it” Frankie Stone (Ann Magnuson) is on the romantic rebound when she accepts an invitation to do a PR campaign for a nerdy scientist and inventor named Jeff Peters (John Malkovich) who has created an amazing android copy of himself. The idea to present the android to the public and make it seem relatable is appealing to Frankie, and so she takes the job. The android’s name is Ulysses, and it’s very childlike and new to the world, and so Frankie takes it out on the town a few times, resulting in some amusing fish out of water scenarios (like when she buys trendy clothes for it for the first time). Ulysses is totally eager to experience everything, including sex, love, eating, and anything where it can learn and adapt, leading to some brand new rewiring in its synapses, which enrages Peters, who never intended its creation to become a love-sick and preoccupied lover. The whole purpose for Ulysses is to send it to space on an unmanned mission to take the place of humans, and so all this love stuff mixes Ulysses up to the point that it can seriously malfunction. When Frankie finds herself strangely infatuated and in love with the android, is it the android she’s loving, or the guy who created it?
A very delightfully ’80s romantic comedy with a twist, Making Mr. Right has a decidedly feminine approach to it, and its director Susan Seidelman (Desperately Seeking Susan) infuses the film with style and verve. Malkovich seemed to have a lot of fun in one of his most lighthearted roles ever, and there’s quite a bit of physical comedy to his performance that had me doing double takes because I’ve never seen him do comedy in this way before. The film’s score by Chaz Jankel is excellent and there’s a really upbeat tone to the whole film, so if you’re looking for a good time, here you go.
Kino Lorber’s new Blu-ray edition of Making Mr. Right comes in a brand new HD master with a 2K scan, and there’s some choice special features on the disc, including a new audio commentary by Seidelman and Magnuson, a new interview with Magnuson, and a new interview with Seidelman, as well as the trailer and a slipcover.
