To begin, the title is an anachronism.  This remnant from the past has been replaced by the PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) and in fact, the prop used in the film was a Palm Pilot.  Also, this film was supposed to fit into the genre of romantic comedy, but I found it un-romantic and un-funny.  However I occasionally need to watch a shallow movie just to exercise my 'film-bashing' muscle and most of this film deserved bashing.  On the good side, the story did not build tension, did not really require my attention, allowed me to do other things, filled up my TV screen with color and provided some Carly Simon vocal music.  It did have another interesting aspect that I'll touch later.

            Brittany Murphy plays Stacy, a cute dippy young woman on her way to the big city to make good.  Most of the film involved her antics about work and about her boy friend.  She is hired-on as an 'associate something' by a fast moving, relationship exposing, reality based TV show.  Here, both Holly Hunter and Kathy Bates provided strong support role background for the storyline.  This early part of the screenplay was done at the level of a TV sitcom, or worse, the kind of stuff that targets the pre-teen age group or the folks who don't care what's on the tube.  For this reason I was surprised by the PG-13 rating.  I thought most of this was innocuous. 

            Then, a plot twist at the end suddenly confronted some real issues: trust, betrayal, denial and the value of truth.  It was all about becoming an adult and it's a shame that it took so long to get to anything worth the film time.  For this brief period, I was impressed with Murphy's acting.  Hunter seemed bored with the role until this ending, but Kathy Bates was fun to watch in her role as the staring TV hostess for all of it.  I was also impressed with Kevin Sussman who had a part as the geeky Ira and Julianne Nicholson who was the ex-girl friend, Joyce.  I'm looking forward to seeing her in Kinsey (2004).

            Reviewed January 24, 2005

            MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for sexual content/humor and language.