听 He directed hit comedy after hit comedy in the 80s, but Ivan Reitman has had mixed fortunes since then. My Super Ex-Girlfriend is one of his better efforts in recent years. It's the "enjoyably silly" story of regular guy Matt (Luke Wilson) tormented by his ex-girlfriend (Uma Thurman) who just happens to have super powers. Ironically though, it was overshadowed by Superman at the box office.
On The Fly
Explaining his decision to direct the film in a 'Making Of' featurette, Reitman says, "It seemed to be a fresh way to do a romantic comedy." Wilson and Thurman insist that the script had them laughing out loud, although Eddie Izzard (playing Professor Bedlam) demonstrates the benefits of improvisation. Snippets of B-roll are thrown in between discussion of more technical matters, like shooting on the streets of New York and staging the superhero stunts. It's a wide-ranging look at the production, but it doesn't go into too much detail.
The actors feel obliged to rave about each other in a second featurette, except for the guy who plays Matt's buddy. "I thought he was his brother," says a disppointed Rainn Wilson, about Luke Wilson, after mistaking him for Owen Wilson. Confused? Well, Reitman seems a little befuddled as well, calling Luke Wilson "a contemporary everyman, but also a likable average guy - if your average guy is really good looking and affable and witty..."
G Force
G-Girl tossing a shark at Matt is one of the more outrageous scenes in the film and technically the most ambitious. That comes under the spotlight in the final featurette, where Reitman and his effects team show us the animated storyboards, careful choreography and CG know-how that went into it. On the business of shooting against a green screen, Wilson admits he felt "a little weird", although it was preferable to tussling with a real Great White... This featurette is the most interesting of the lot, although it is the shortest at just under five minutes.
An extended version of the shark sequence is presented among six deleted scenes. Aside from that, the funniest sequence finds Matt taking G-Girl for granted with a gang of boisterous bikers. The rest of the footage includes a few flashbacks to G-Girl's youth and Eddie Izzard camping it up as the arch villain.
Sadly there are no commentaries to accompany the deleted scenes or the main feature. A music video by Molly McQueen helps pad out a rather meagre bonus menu. Still, this comedy is worth checking out if it flew under your radar the first time around.
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