A plot , or something like it

Freud once said that the unexamined life is not worth living. But apparently, such an atrocity can be turned around in seven days. Neatly condense that week into a two-hour film, and you have Life or Something Like It, the latest addition to a genre of feel-good movies that try to put a sunny spin on the most devastating of all questions: "What have I done with my life? Has it been worth it?"

It all starts when a bedraggled street prophet (Tony Shaloub) tells Seattle TV journalist Lanie Kerrigan (Angelina Jolie) that she is going to die in a week. The poor gal has seven days to come to terms with her life and the goals she has set for herself.

Suddenly her cameraman (Edward Burns), with whom she has always been at odds, turns out to be a man who can lend her insight into her own befuddled life before it all may end.

The problem is that, in the midst of her pondering the true ingredients of a happy existence, Lanie never actually gets around to much soul-searching. Somehow, scriptwriters John Scott Shepherd and Dana Stevens managed to miss the fact that they wrote a story about a nervous breakdown, without the actual breakdown.

Apparently, they have their own ideas about what a woman does when she wants to live a little. Once she starts to "change," Lanie quits her rigid exercise regimen and dives into fast food with a vengeance. Oh, and she listens to loud music and wears her glasses. Egad, the woman has gone 'round the bend.

The actors do what they can to add depth to a thoroughly shallow script. Jolie creates some convincing moments of revelation during talks with her sister and father. She is able to convince audience members that she is questioning her entire existence. But there is very little room on the silver screen for deep interior monologues.

 Essentially, this movie lacks heart -- something that is discernible only after watching the entire piece. Though the humor is superficial, it is nonetheless entertaining. But when viewers hearken back to the film -- and they most certainly will, since reevaluating one's life is a nearly constant theme in this society -- they may look for help and find none. Not only is Lanie a caricature of Freud's "life unexamined," but she also does almost no real changing, at least none that is apparent until the last five minutes of the movie.

The moral here seems to be that a life can be turned around in a matter of days, and that it requires almost no effort or substantial pain for the person making the changes. People who have worked to transform their lives will certainly resent these implications. Everyone else should just resent the manipulative style of writing.