BECAUSE I SAID SO

REVIEWED BY CHARITY BISHOP

Our rating: 2 out of 5

Because of: sexual implications, dialogue, and content

Rated:

Every single one of us is just a little bit like one or both of our parents. Some of us don't want to admit it, and it certainly took me a few years to realize that I'm a lot more like my mom than I thought, but deep down despite all of our arguments, we cannot deny that our parents' DNA is imprinted on our genetic make up. This is one fact that drives the daughters of Daphne (Diane Keaton) absolutely insane.

A meddling woman who just wants to see all three of her girls married and settled with the right man, Daphne has succeeded in just standing back and allowing two out of the three to find marital bliss without her. Maggie (Lauren Graham) is a psychologist and has a successful career and a nice man who welcomes her home at night. Mae (Piper Perabo) is a little more free-spirited but nevertheless has a great love life. And then there is Maggie (Mandy Moore). Wrapped up in the world of cooking and catering to wealthy benefit dinners, private parties, and weddings, Maggie is too preoccupied to keep a relationship going for more than about a week, and her mom is starting to worry that she'll never find Mr. Right. Rather than leave her daughter alone and hope that she finds her own way through the dangerous world of dating, Daphne places an internet ad as a mom searching for a "meaningful, long-term relationship for her daughter."

Soon, she finds out that online dating isn't all it's cracked up to be, since most of the men she interviews are downright unsuitable. The entire fiasco is witnessed by a young musician, Johnny (Gabriel Macht), who encourages her to let Maggie alone, but then enters Jason (Tom Everett Scott). A wealthy architect who is mild mannered, extremely polite, and interested in eventual marriage with the prospective woman of his dreams, Jason is everything Daphne could have dreamed of. She sets the pair up without Maggie's knowledge, little realizing that Johnny has stepped in behind her back and introduced himself to Maggie. The young caterer is now torn between one guy that understands her, and the other who offers everything she could have ever dreamed of. The result is a very funny but ultimately sweet romantic comedy about learning to find your place in the world.

The contrast between the two men is very different, since one of them is focused and serious, and the other one is much more at ease. Maggie changes when she is around both of them, and is only truly herself while with Johnny. The film places them in occasionally parallel situations to show how each guy reacts, but does not vilify Jason in any way, which is refreshing because while he has his faults, he's certainly not a bad guy. The sisters have a very close relationship with one another, and Maggie ultimately comes to realize just what makes her mom tick, while Daphne learns that it is her own unhappiness that makes her so overly possessive of her daughters. In fact, if it weren't for the slew of unfortunate sexual conversations, implications, and shenanigans, I would heartily recommend it as a mother/daughter flick, because watching the two of them move furniture together is bound to make more than a few of us realize just how much like our mothers we are. It really is a shame that so much gums up the spokes on this one, because it is cute.

An early scene has Maggie holding a whispered conference over the phone, talking about how nervous she is because her one night stand isn't circumcised. Not only does she sleep with both the men in her life on a regular basis (kissing and fooling around is shown in a montage), she and her sisters and mother engage in frank discussions about sex and orgasms. She first overhears and then walks in on her mom taking a tumble in the sheets with a man. Daphne is late to her own wedding because she is graphically fooling around with her fiancée. Johnny's little boy enjoys pointing out that women have vaginas. A scene after the opening credits shows the sisters in their underwear; they are shown having massages. We catch some ample glimpses of flesh. There's not much language apart from a handful of mild abuses of deity and one use of GD. 

There were a lot of enjoyable moments in the movie, but not enough to make up for the embarrassing sexual conversations, not to mention the horrible, non-funny scene in which Daphne enters an adult dating site without realizing what it is, and logs in to a sexual encounter. Moaning and spanking sounds fill the house, while her excited dog starts humping a chair. Later, she logs on to the same site out of boredom. It could have been such a cute date flick with a little more sensitivity on the part of the filmmakers.