Generally speaking, including Jennifer Lopez in your romantic comedy puts the film halfway toward being watchable. Although Lopez had a natural chemistry with George Clooney (“Out of Sight”) and Matthew McConaughey (“The Wedding Planner”), she has also had it with less notable men, such as Michael Vartan (“Monster in Law”) or Alex O’Loughlin (“The Back-Up Plan”), with whom she has also worked.
Lopez co-stars with Josh Duhamel in the frothy action romantic comedy “Shotgun Wedding,” which was directed by Jason Moore. Lopez isn’t quite Clark Gable, but she pulls it off. Always, she does. The two argue and banter with classic screwball brio as a couple whose destination wedding is interrupted by hostage-taking pirate-terrorists, with a love-hate relationship that is both hilarious and effortlessly plausible. A lot of the dialogue has the stilted, manufactured quality of a poorly written sitcom. But when J. Lo said that, I really did believe it.
The comedy of remarriage, in which a bitter couple rediscovers their love after drifting apart, and the single-setting terrorism film, in which an Everyman (or Everywoman) must rescue captives from an elite team of armed bad guys, are combined in a very innovative fashion in “Shotgun Wedding.” In essence, a wedding in the Philippine serves as the lavish tropical setting for this “Die Hard” meets “The Awful Truth” mashup. It’s a good setting, and as Lopez and Duhamel start using machine guns and grenades against their enemies, it has a certain fresh fascination to see the tensions of an action thriller and a rom-com being humorously juxtaposed. The forced air of ingratiating comedy is less pleasant. There are several cloying pop culture allusions and current-event punchlines, such as gags about Etsy and gaslighting. It has a desperate attempt to go viral vibe, which is wildly at odds with the rest of the movie’s charming simplicity.
Shotgun Wedding
R-rated for abusive language, suggestive sexual content, and unexpectedly brutal violence. Duration: one hour and forty minutes. Visit Amazon Prime Video to watch.
