With so much fundamentally wrong in the world right now, it’s probably a misuse of energy to care too much about Overboard. But for sheer pointlessness, laziness and obvious lack of shits given, this gender-reversed remake of the 1987 Goldie Hawn/Kurt Russell vehicle takes some beating. Anna Faris plays Kate, an overworked single parent who cons amnesiac yacht owner Leonardo (Eugenio Derbez) into thinking he is her husband. Then, accompanied by a ferociously jolly score that sounds as though it was recorded by a demonically possessed klezmer band, she effectively uses him as slave labour, kitchen skivvy and on-tap childcare. Although Faris is not in the role originally played by Hawn (Goldie was the spoilt heiress to Russell’s widowed carpenter), she channels her predecessor’s acting style, going all out with the bubbly, goofy ditz act. Derbez, meanwhile, is as two-dimensional as the cartoon of Speedy Gonzales he has tattooed on his buttock. All this wouldn’t grate quite as painfully if there was even a flicker of the rocket-powered chemistry of Hawn and Russell. But for this Kate and Leonardo, the relationship prospects are about as seaworthy as the Titanic.
