This weekend I watched "Love and Other Drugs" on DVD and went to the movies and saw "Source Code".
I had wanted to see Love and Other Drugs for a while, but hadn't gotten around to it when it was showing at the movies. Source Code interested me because I like Science Fiction, but I saw it partly because there was nothing else showing at a similar time I was interested in when I was at the movies. (It was a spur of the moment - oh, I'm in the city, cinema is nearby, I'll go see a movie - rather than a planned trip).
Overall, I enjoyed Source Code more than Love and Other Drugs, but overall, I would describe them both as just "ok".
Love and Other Drugs also starred Anne Hathaway, whom I love. Maybe it's because I had wanted to see it for a while I built up high expectations, but honestly, I really didn't enjoy this movie. I found it dragged on, so on the one hand when it finished I was pleased, on the other hand I was thinking "that's it?" I wouldn't say there was anything particularly wrong with the movie. The chemistry between Gyllenhaal and Hathaway was good, but it really just felt like not much happened. There were some interesting "sub-plots" - having to go to Canada because you can't afford medication in the US; a homeless man who starts taking Prozac because he lives near a dumpster where Gyllenhaal's character is throwing it out (because he is trying to sell Zoloft, a competitor drug), and it seems to be improving his life; but these weren't explored in any depth. I think it's a relevant point that drug companies (particularly in the US) will sell anything to anyone - if you can afford it. If you can't - well, too bad.
Source Code - as I mentioned, it's a science fiction film. It was fairly short when compared to films these days, only an hour and 33 minutes. Basically Gyllenhaal plays a soldier who is "somehow" able to inhabit a man's last 8 minutes alive. The man in question is on a train which blows up. Gyllenhaal is meant to figure out who blows it up so they can stop another attack, but it's not time travel - that is, to Gyllenhaal's dismay, he can't actually "save" the train or passengers - what has happened has happened. It was an interesting movie, and I know it's not reality, but it would have been nice if they had tried to explain some logical reason that this could occur. The focus on the movie becomes more on what has happened to Gyllenhaal's character in the past rather than the people in the train. Overall it was enjoyable, but not something I would see more than once.
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