At the same festival where Billy Eichner just attempted to revive the once-lucrative Apatow formula of sweet and salty with his queer comedy Bros, Shekhar Kapur, director of Elizabeth and Bandit Queen, is returning after an extended absence to try to resurrect the equally popular and equally dormant Working Title romcom with What’s Love Got to Do with It?, a fun, frothy and forgettable itch-scratcher. Both stick to a familiar playbook for subgenres that essentially come with a strict style guide attached but both also try to find a diverse retelling of stories that have been traditionally told with white, straight people at the centre.
Kapur’s isn’t quite as successful or specific as Eichner’s but it’s a slick reminder of the calming comfort that comes from the Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner blueprint – all handsome London locations and big, unfettered emotions – and it’s smooth and likable enough to encourage more of the same (rumours of a fourth Bridget Jones movie likely to be confirmed within weeks). Kapur might not have any experience within the comedy genre but his lavish, action-heavy period dramas have allowed him to master epic canvas storytelling and it lends the film a glossy grandness that’s been missing from the romcom ever since Netflix helped usher it back and flatten it down. It looks and feels big, gliding between continents and cultures, location upon location upon location. It might never reach emotions of the same size but its ease is hard to resist.
