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This multiple-plot film starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Huey Lewis, Paul Giamatti, Andre Braugher, Maria Bello (Coyote Ugly), and Scott Speedman (“Felicity”) as three unlikely pairs on separate paths toward a sing-out in Omaha, lensed by Gwyneth’s TV-director dad Bruce Paltrow, was supposed to have been released last May. Now I understand the delay. It certainly wasn’t to coincide with the co-starring appearance of Gwyneth’s mom, Blythe Danner, in Meet the Parents. And I don’t think it was because, as rumored, Disney considered the movie too violent to warrant a big-buck publicity campaign, opting instead to bury it in a more competitive weekend and take the tax write-off. Well, the tax thing is probably true. But the reason they held it back was that nobody realized during production that they’d forgotten the most important axiom in filmmaking, even more basic than the “never stand a short guy next to Sigourney Weaver” rule: “actors don’t sing, and singers don’t act. Just ask Woody Allen.”
Disney must not have had much faith in the concept to begin with. Duets looks like it was shot with cheap cameras on cheap film under cheap lights. The story is interesting in places; Braugher and Giamatti in particular make an intriguing team as an escaped convict hitchhiking home to Chicago and a desperately burned-out salesman who steps out of the house to buy cigarettes and never comes back. But the rest isn’t worth bothering with. And in case you’ve been lying awake nights wondering why Gwyneth Paltrow and Huey Lewis never did a movie together before now, you can get to sleep, because all they do is accentuate each other’s most glaring weaknesses. He has as much trouble showing emotion as she does getting through “Bette Davis Eyes.” D+
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