Peyton Reed’s Down With Love dials in on Renée Zellweger, ‘50s rom-coms, and the libido-reducing powers of chocolate

“She can have sex whenever she likes, without love, and enjoy it the way a man does: à la carte.”

This is the promise Renée Zellweger makes to her fellow woman in Peyton Reed’s Down With Love—a topsy-turvy sleeper masterpiece of the early 2000s. After crafting an undebatable smash with Bring It On three years prior, Reed swung for the fences with a campy, unorthodox ode with rom-coms of the past to middling success at the time. However—like any good journalism scoop—Down With Love is sensational, surprising, and tightly packaged, making it worthy of a loving reevaluation. 

It’s got a little Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, a little Austin Powers, and a lot of the Rock Hudson-Doris Day led rom-coms of the ‘50s, particularly Lover Come Back and Pillow Talk. The film’s influences are so clear it could be hard to see if it's giving viewers anything new, but Reed offers a homage to the greats of the genre’s past while poking fun at its historical gender politics and upending the status quo. It straddles the difficult line of emulating a previous Hollywood era while modernizing the storyline for contemporary audiences. 

Zellweger plays our feminist vanguard lead—Barbara Novak—who pens a bestselling self-help book about abstaining from male love (primarily by eating lots of chocolate) in the pursuit of self-empowerment and career success, much to the chagrin of every so-so man in the world. Enter Ewan McGregor’s Catcher Block (an utterly insane name), a womanizing magazine writer who’s unconvinced of Novak’s devotion to her too-good-to-be-true cause. Deeming himself cunning and irresistible to any woman, he decides to seduce Novak in order to crush her commitment to celibacy and romance. Pack in a litany of visual and verbal double entendre, and the horny battle of the sexes is off to the races. 

What is set up as a simple romantic ruse becomes an off-the-rails revenge plot I won’t dare spoil here, solidifying Down With Love’s place as one of the most woefully underrated rom-coms of the 2000s. Though Zellweger made her name with Bridget Jones’s Diary two years earlier, her star shines brighter in Down With Love, giving her more room to play and drive the narrative. 

In the supporting cast, Sarah Paulson appears in an early role as Novak’s best friend Vikki Heller, foiled by David Hyde Pierce as Block’s confidante. The two orbit one another before entering an unconvincing romance of their own, because what else are two gay best friends in the ‘60s supposed to do?

Visually, Down With Love is swanky, chic, and high-femme. The costuming (courtesy of Daniel Orlandi) is to die for, elevating the color scheme and giving the opportunity for playful character entrances. The film’s use of rear projection in driving scenes and its creation of its New York City views cements Reed’s devotion to the classics of the ‘60s. With its cranked up “pretty-in-pink” aesthetics and attention to the feminine, Down With Love’s reminiscent of other greats of the 2000s, such as Charlie’s Angels and Josie And The Pussycats. 

All fit with dreamy surrealism and tongue-in-cheek comedy stylings, there’s a level of high camp particular to its fellow women-catered blockbuster comedies of the era. Add in Zellweger’s star power at the time, it’s almost hard to believe that for some reason or another, it just did not garner the attention or praise it deserved at release. Now, it’s become one of the many films to jut itself into the cultural conversation 20 years after its creation, to our delicious benefit.