I honestly only saw the trailers for this movie once and had no clue what the story was going to be about.  All I knew was that it looked like another chick flick/love story, not that there is anything wrong with those.  I will be the first to admit that I loved The Notebook. Going back to No Reservations, the flick stars Catherine Zeta Jones (The Mask of Zorro, Intolerable Cruelty), Aaron Eckhart (Thank You For Smoking (phenomenal film)) and Abigail Breslin (little girl from Little Miss Sunshine).

The Plot: Catherine Zeta-Jones plays a character name Kate, who is the lead chef in a very high class Italian restaurant in New York City.  Her boss makes her see a therapist, because besides her amazing ability to cook, she has a very boring and depressing life.  She tells her therapist that she has not been in a relationship in three years. 

One day, her sister decides to come visit her with her niece, Zoe (played by Breslin).  On their way to see Kate, they get into an accident and her sister is killed, leaving Zoe with no home.  Kate is forced to take her in.  With this new addition in her life, she also gets a new addition in the kitchen.  Nick, played by Aaron Eckhart, is hired while Kate is away from work to deal with the loss of her sister.  When she gets back, she does not like the fact that another chef has been hired in her kitchen.  She feels that she should be the one who hires and fires people.  This obviously creates drama, but shocker, the film is a love story and they begin to fall in love.  The film basically shows you Kate’s struggle to deal with this new child in her life and this new chef in her kitchen.  They both change her for the better. 

The Review: Overall, the film was decent but had too many emotions flying around.  It just felt like I was driving up and down a hill.  One minute the film would be happy and then next minute it would be extremely depressing.  I guess you could use the term “rollercoaster of emotions” to describe it. 

There was nothing wrong with Zeta-Jones, Eckhart, or Breslin.  I felt that they all had fine performances, but to me the movie was just “blah.”   Speaking of performances, if you want to see an amazing performance by Eckhart, please go out and rent Thank You For Smoking.  I was talking to someone today about that film and they were saying that it is overrated.  That person couldn’t be more wrong.  The writing in that film was just beyond amazing. 

One thing I really wanted to point out about No Reservations was the amazing music in the film.  The score to the film, done by Philip Glass was fantastic.  It kind of reminded me a little of the score from Requiem For a Dream because of how it kept repeating over and over. 

The Verdict: It was not that it was a bad movie, it just didn’t do much for me.  I just really felt that it was extremely average, which I feel can be best seen either as a rental or an H.B.O. viewing.  I do not feel that you need to run out to theatres and spend your hard earned money on it, hence the 2.5 BDK rating.