Valentine's Day

It's a case of too many stars and not enough character development in the Love Actually clone Valentine's Day .

There's so much going on and so many characters to acquaint yourself with in the end you don't really care. What the film is trying to show, and it succeeds in some areas, is that Valentine's Day is experienced in many different ways.

Some people adore it and revel in the sending and receiving of flowers and valentines while others, quite hilariously, despise the day.

A Who's Who of Hollywood's B-List (with a few notable A Listers) line up in Valentine's Day to bring us stories of a guy who proposes to his girlfriend (who says yes, sort of)only to have her leave him, of teenage love, of love lost and love remembered, of boyhood crushes, infidelity, of anti-love, the obligatory gay storyline (between two very mismatched actors I must say) and of finding true love.

Without going through everyone's storylines, the ones I liked were as follows.

Ashton Kutcher, who played flower salesman Reed, seemed to hold the film together and I have to say he was very solid.

I enjoyed the story around Kara (Jessica Biel), a sports agent who loathes Valentine's Day and holds her own I Hate Valentine's Day party each year. The smashing of the pinata was a highlight for me.

Queen Latifah was quite funny as powerbroker Paula and her storyline intertwining with Anne Hathaway's Liz, who moonlights as a 'phone entertainment worker' was great. And I liked Topher Grace's character Jason.

I didn't think much of the teenagers, particularly the Taylor Swift-Taylor Lautner segments.

I have to say this was pretty poor when you consider that the likes of Julia Roberts (who had a great role and a bit surprising), Shirley MacLaine and Kathy Bates were involved.

Despite liking parts I can only give a 5.5 out of 10 and say that if you're going to do a romantic comedy then try not to stack the deck too much, because it doesn't work.

That, and Love Actually did it better.