Music and Lyrics (PG) *** (From Times Series)

Music and Lyrics (PG) ***

4:45pm Thursday 8th February 2007

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DIRECTORS of romantic comedy must go down on their knees and thank whatever movie gods they pray to whenever Drew Barrymore agrees to do one of their pictures.

Barrymore is like Peter Pan, sprinkling fairy dust wherever she goes and enabling the lamest film to fly through her sheer likeability.

Fortunately, she has a lot to work with in this surprisingly entertaining romcom. For one thing, there is Hugh Grant who is still the best at what he does. For another, there is Marc Lawrence, who wrote and directed.

Lawrence is not much of a director but he writes good scripts. His films are packed with the snappy back and forth banter that used to be a genre staple but is so hard to do that only really good practitioners, such as Barrymore and Grant, can pull it off.

Grant is former 80s pop idol whose career is on the wane. He is given a shot in the arm by an upcoming Christina clone, who wants to sing a duet with him, providing he writes the song.

His problem is he could not write home for money. Enter Barrymore as the ditzy plant girl who looks after the foliage in his apartment and turns out to have a neat way with a lyric.

Before you know it, these two are churning out three-chord gold. When things are going this well can romance be far away? Well, yes, but only far enough away to ensure it does turn out all right in the very end.

Apart from being consummate romcom stars, Barrymore and Grant have a winning chemistry. In a romantic comedy if the audience likes the stars enough to want them to get together you are halfway home.

As insurance there is wonderful comic support from Kristen Johnson and the sublime Brad Garrett, while Campbell Scott pops up as the closest thing the film has to a villain.

Music and Lyrics may be entirely predictable to the point of contrivance, but that does not stop it being highly amusing.

Director: Marc Lawrence Running time: 103mins

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