~ Take that Brad, says Jennifer ~. Review on The Break-Up Movie

Dir: Payton Reed.

Cast: Jennifer Aniston, Vince Vaughn, Jon Favreau,Jason Bateman, Joey Lauren Adams.

Jennifer Aniston must have laughed out loud when The Break-Up script landed on her doormat. With her marriage to Brad Pitt just over, who could blame Jen if she'd turned down flat this bittersweet comedy on the pain of splitting. The fact she said yes shows what a trouper she is - and it turned out for the best now she' hooked up with her co-star Vince Vaughn (and broken up again). And in the spirit of the film, it would be a great bit of one-upmanship if she and Vince's cinematic effort proved more successful than Brad and love rival Angelina Jolie's Mr & Mrs Smith.

Sadly, despite The Break-Up being the better movie and a seriously high class rom-com, it hasn't gone down well in the States. But those humourless critics across the pond got confused because it is both a comedy and an intelligent look at the characteristics of a dying relationship. Aniston and Vaughn are obviously meant to be together on screen as the banter flows.

The Break-Up inevitably starts with the Get-Together. A chance meeting at a baseball game dissolves into a relationship photo-montage of Jen and Vince. Jennifer is chic Chicago art gallery boss Brooke who lives with unlikely partner Gary - played by Vince - a beer-slurping, video game-addicted tour guide who can't work the washing machine. The final straw comes when he forgets lemons for a dinner party she's slaved for their parents. They split but both refuse to vacate their trendy appartment and the war begins.

Traditional romantic comedy takes a back-seat as the couple haul each other over the coals and dare to tell it like it is. It's funny as their world implodes and their friends take sides. Here, director Peyton Reed - who brought us the Kirsten Dunst cheerleading comedy Bring It On and period Ewan McGregor rom-com Down With Love - clearly gave Vaughn free reign to improvise, and few can shoot their mouth off quite as effectively.

Vince steals round one with his trademark slick monologues on the cons of relationships and soon settles into an uninterrupted life of PlayStation. Aniston too is no slouch, and hearing the former butter-wouldn't-melt sitcom star cuss and swear and hold her own against a barrage of abuse may be worth the ticket entry alone. She tries to make him see the error of his ways by pretending not to care, dating other guys to make him jealous and wandering around naked. What shocked some critics is how nasty the couple are to each other, but hey, grow up, that's breaking up.

Both Vince and Jen are outstanding in a cast further enhanced by Vince's real-life pal Jon Favreau, as unhelpful mate Johnny O, and Jason Bateman as Riggleman. The on-screen chemistry between Favreau and Vaughn is great and it's when they are bantering together that you're reminded that somewhere down the line, The Break-Up was conceived as a comedy. The end is refreshingly un-Hollywood and most people would leave the cinema with a lump in their throat. As the Abba song goes "Breaking up is never easy."

The Break-Up doesn't turn the rom-com on it's head, but with it's focus on the darker side of love manages to gently tip it on it's side.