Ryan Reynolds may have finally established himself as a rom-com leading man with his portrayal of Andrew, the overworked assistant to Sandra Bullock’s joyless Margaret Tate. Bullock herself has long-since mastered the role of the powerful woman who is unaware of or uninterested in her own sex appeal. The pairing of Reynolds and Bullock in The Proposal has both chemistry and laughs.
The story is not unfamiliar territory. Tate, a hotshot editor at a New York publishing house, happens to be Canadian and somewhat careless when it comes to dealing with INS. This earns her a one-way ticket home until she comes up with the idea of forcing Andrew, an American, to marry her. Reynolds’ expression when Margaret springs her plan on him is a masterful example of understated comic acting. Andrew’s motivation is, ostensibly, to keep Margaret from destroying his aspirations of becoming an editor himself (though if he refused and she was deported, her influence might not go so far). He quickly realizes that, for once, he has the upper hand, and goes along with the idea. What follows is a somewhat predictable but always enjoyable crash course for Andrew and Margaret on life as a couple in the confines of Andrew’s family estate in - where else - Alaska.
The supporting cast is also memorable, with Betty White playing Andrew’s irreverent grandmother and Oscar Nunez (Oscar, from TV’s The Office) playing Ramone, a hilarious jack-of-all trades in the small Alaskan town whose talents are not limited to erotic dancing. Denis O’Hare plays the INS agent who has guessed Margaret’s ruse, and he brings some extra zing to a role which could have been the stereotypical humorless bureaucratic bad guy. (Although the speed and efficiency of the INS is wildly overstated for the sake of the plot.)
Everyone knows where this movie is heading when one walks in the theater (to the extent that my main disappointment was that a great line from the trailer for the movie is replaced by a less-funny take in the final cut), but that doesn’t make the ride any less fun.