2K Replay: JUST FRIENDS

 by Adam Riske

Nominated for “Best Kiss” (Anna Faris and Christopher Marquette) at the MTV Movie Awards. They lost to Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal in Brokeback Mountain.

• Best Scene/Moment: Chris Klein’s meltdown after Amy Smart rejects him followed by a bouncer at the bar physically throwing Ryan Reynolds out while saying “and stay out” with him then walking away going “I’ve always wanted to say that.” It’s a tour de force minute of comedy.

• Best Song: “I Swear” by All-4-One.

• Best Merch: Not much to choose from here so I went with a “Just Friends Movie Paper Regal Cinema Theater Ticket Stub Opening Month 2005” for $19.99. Why did Regal just call the movie “Friends”? Laziness like this is probably why the two Regals near me closed. This bugs me. It’s like when I was a kid and my friend’s mom called it “Honey I Shrunk” and under my 7-year-old breath I was like “The Kids.”

• Director Grade: Just Friends was directed by Roger Kumble.
Great Movies: N/A
Good Movies: Cruel Intentions, Just Friends
OK Movies: The Sweetest Thing
Bad Movies: N/A
Unseen By Me: Cruel Intentions 2, College Road Trip, Furry Vengeance, Falling Inn Love, After We Collided, Beautiful Disaster, Beautiful Wedding
Overall Grade: B-

• Double It with This 2005 Movie: The Dukes of Hazzard

• Year 2005 Movies to Trailer Before Them: The Amityville Horror (2005), Waiting…, Wedding Crashers

• Never Talk to Strangers or Just Friends? Just Friends

• Mall Movie? Yeah. It’s high school-centric in its premise, which I think automatically makes the movie mall material.

• Only in 2005: A sequence centered around The Notebook as a punchline.

• Scene Stealer: Anna Faris and Chris Klein. They take over the movie (in a good way) anytime either appear.

• I Miss: When I didn’t have a giant Ryan Reynolds allergy.

• I Don’t Miss (tie): Some of the movie’s humor is outdated and Ryan Reynolds in a fat suit, which is genuinely unsettling.

• 2005 Crush (tie): Amy Smart and Anna Faris.

• 2025 Crush (tie): Amy Smart and Anna Faris.

• What I Thought in 2005: I caught up with Just Friends at the dollar theater and was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked it. I laughed a lot and enjoyed most of the performances and slapstick. As Patrick has said before about other movies, Just Friends is a movie where you feel like the filmmakers are getting away with something.

• What I Think in 2025: It’s pretty good. I liked it more in 2005 than I did now but it’s almost entirely because I almost can’t stand Ryan Reynolds anymore. The supporting cast is consistently funny, and I appreciate that it’s a comedy packed with jokes that feels a little edgy, like it will forgo any good manners of a standard romantic comedy in order to get laughs.