By Curt Schleier

DVDs often bring surprises.  The comparative intimacy of a smaller screen regularly brings to life things I missed in a movie theater: an actor’s subtle gesture, an inflection in a voice, an unexpected expression. 

With LICENSE TO WED, well, not so much.  In fact, watching it for a second time convinced me how wrong I was to watch it a first time.

A colleague recently posted a Critical Mass rant, offering what he considered the top ten – how did he so delicately phrase it – Holy Sh*t moments.  By that, of course, he meant moments so unexpectedly surprising that the only normal reaction is “Holy Sh*t!” 

Well I had a series of Holy Sh*t moments watching this one, such as, “Holy Sh*t, someone approved this script.”  The story is so retro it might not even have worked as cave drawings in the cinemalithic period.

Ben Murphy (John Krasinski) and Sadie Jones (Mandy Moore) meet cute in a Starbucks and fall in love.  Sadie wants to be married at St. Augustine’s, her family’s church of thankfully unknown denomination.  But Rev. Frank (Robin Williams) won’t perform the ceremony until the couple go through a marriage counseling boot camp that might put the Marines to shame.


The young couple is humiliated, spied on (a microphone is secretly placed in their bedroom) and browbeaten.  The marriage counseling includes a class in which couples are encouraged to fight with each other and another that includes a visit to a maternity ward where every painful birthing cliché is put on display. They have to carry around robot babies who are constantly crying, soiling their diapers or both.  It is embarrassing to watch.

And it’s especially sad because the actors are so attractive; it seems a shame to waste so much talent.  Mandy Moore is one of the few young women of her generation who can play virginal and be believed.  John Krasinski has built some street cred with his comic turns on The Office.  And Robin Moore gives an unusually restrained performance – perhaps hoping he won’t be noticed.

On the subject of noticing, I did notice something creepy in the DVD that I’d missed in the movie.  Rev. Frank’s only friend seems to be a choir boy (Josh Flitter), a prepubescent youngster and constant sidekick.  It seems, well, unseemly.


If I sound a little angry, it’s because I am.  I can forgive a bad picture. I can’t forgive one that presumes I’m an idiot.