"Bride Wars": All dressed up and going nowhere

The real star of "Bride Wars" is not Kate Hudson or Anne Hathaway, but a dress: an ephemeral cloud-white Vera Wang with a strapless top, ribbon sash and vast ballerina skirt. It plays its role beautifully, turning charmingly askew in a fight scene, and at one point even standing up by itself. And, since it presumably cannot read screenplays, it is blameless for its participation in this silly, screechy comedy.

Everybody else involved in this project should have taken a closer look at the script, and realized that it works far better as a two-and-a-half minute trailer. (Watch the trailer, and you'll get every plot point and funny moment in the movie, nicely paced and scored. You've just saved the cost of the ticket.) "Bride Wars" is yet another chick flick that trades on the obnoxious idea that women become selfish, catfighting harpies when faced with the prospect of planning their weddings — and that all women want is a proposal, at all costs. Every woman in this movie is unhappy: The prospective brides are self- absorbed and miserable, their unengaged friends turn to pills and food binges to numb their pain at not being hitched, and their one married friend is sickened by her husband (whom she tricked into marrying her). This is a comedy?

Directed by Gary Winick — who made the very sweet "13 Going on 30" a few years back, and should know better — "Bride Wars" unfolds with the inevitability of a much-repeated sitcom episode. Liv (Hudson), a lawyer, and Emma (Hathaway), a teacher, are longtime friends who've always dreamed of getting married at the Plaza Hotel. When their very generic boyfriends (Bryan Greenberg and Chris Pratt, respectively) propose, the gals squeal with delight and head to a high-powered wedding planner (Candice Bergen, playing it grim) who sets them up with their dream weddings and blathers a lot of nonsense about "couple style." Then things get screwed up, and the friends are told that one must change her plans. Neither wants to, and a nasty game of sabotage — orange spray-tan! blue highlights! you saw it all in the trailer! — begins.

Hudson and Hathaway are likable performers who occasionally find a moment of fun — Hudson does a nice, snarly reading of the line "If I were your wedding, I'd be very scared right now" — but they're stuck playing a pair of spoiled brats. Like "27 Dresses," which occupied the January chick-wedding-flick slot last year, "Bride Wars" features very few moments of recognizable human behavior; unlike "27 Dresses," it doesn't even distract us with lots of funny bridal fashion. That poor Vera Wang gown has to carry the movie, and that's too much to ask of any dress. Right now, the Wang is probably calling up the green gown from "Atonement," asking how to get fixed up with a better script. I wish it luck.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725

or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com