Abby (Katherine Heigl) is the successful producer of a news program which is running into rating trouble, so the owners hire Mike (Gerard Butler), whose show The Ugly Truth reinvigorates the slot. Within The Ugly Truth Mike exposes the real battle of the sexes, which is an anathema to Abby’s idea of the perfect relationship. When Abby meets her perfect mate, in the form of a doctor, mike makes Abby a deal, he will teach her enough about what men want, in order for her to get her man, or he will quit the show...

The Ugly Truth (2009 - 1 hr, 36 min, 57 sec) is a romantic comedy written by Nicole Eastman, Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith. The film was directed by Robert Luketic (Legally Blonde (2001)).

Romantic comedies tend to stick to a tried and tested structure. Stick two unlikely people together, preferably they should dislike each other, then the audience can sit back and watch them fall in love, before we wrap the whole thing up with a happy ending. The Ugly Truth is no different in this respect. What the film does have going for it is a script full of amusing incidents and slick dialogue, although the amount of profanity in the film seemed oddly out of place and unnecessary to either the main characters relationship or their situation.

Both Heigl and Butler are very personable actors and I found spending an hour and a half in their company a pleasant, and on occasion, funny experience. That the main cast were good did stop John Michael Higgins (Larry) and Cheryl Hines (Georgina) as the squabbling news readers from stealing the film - there's a whole film lurking in there just staring those two characters.

This is a new movie, so as one would expect it looks very good on Blu-ray, detail is god, blacks are inky and the warm colour scheme gives the whole film a lush quality. Audio is English, French or German 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio, with an English descriptive track and twelve optional subtitle tracks. There is a commentary on some of the scenes with director Robert Luketic and producer Gary Lucchesi, which are less illuminating than they could be, tending to lean towards the more technical side of things.

The extras continue with six deleted and extended scenes (16 min, 22 sec), though there is nothing here which would be missed from the final film. You also get two alternative endings (5 min, 12 sec), the first just has some of the dialogue reversed, whereas the second has a whole wedding scene which is missing from the final cut.

You get a Gag Reel (10 min, 22 sec), which is amusing at best and The Truth is Ugly: Capturing the Male and Female Point of View (12 min, 48 sec) wherein the makers try and convince the audience that they were trying to make a balanced film, whereas the movie is based on a lot of myths that each sex has about the other. The extras finish with The Art of Laughter: A Making of Hilarious Proportions (15 min, 53 sec) which tries to convince the audience about why the film is as funny as they feel it is, and finally some trailers.

Whilst this isn’t in the pantheon of classic romantic comedies, both my better half and I both enjoyed watching the film, which is pretty rare where this genre is concerned. The extras have tended to be on the light side but the presentation of the main feature is pretty good.

7

Charles Packer