Story
Jane Nichols (Katherine Heigl) is an attractive young woman with a seemingly incurable fascination with weddings. Jane has personally arranged the weddings of 27 friends and relatives, acting as bridesmaid on each occasion. Jane is also an avid reader of newspaper wedding column journalist ‘Malcolm’ Doyle (James Marsden), and has a collection of many of his articles.
Unfortunately, Jane appears unable to engineer her own romantic attachments, largely due to the long-standing infatuation she has had with her boss George (Edward Burns). Entirely unaware of this situation, George begins dating Jane’s younger sister, Tess (Malin Akerman). The obvious difficulty Jane faces with their relationship is magnified by the fact that Tess has purposely misrepresented herself to George as an outdoorsy, vegetarian animal lover (all traits that George finds appealing).
Meanwhile, Jane unwittingly meets her favourite writer ‘Malcolm’ Doyle, who introduces himself as Kevin Doyle (his real name). Kevin becomes interested in writing an article about Jane and her wardrobe of expensive bridesmaid dresses. But after completing the first draft of this article, he begins to fall in love with Jane and changes his mind about publishing the story. Kevin’s hard-nosed editor (Melora Hardin) decides to print the article anyway, which deeply hurts Jane and leaves her feeling betrayed.
After a great deal of soul-searching, Jane realises that her feelings for George were never based in reality, and that, despite everything that has happened, she really loves Kevin.
Themes
Family conflict
Violence
One scene shows Tess throwing several hardware items at her sister Jane during a heated argument.
Content that may disturb children
Under 8
In one scene, a photo is shown of Tess holding what appears to be a dead cat.
Over 8
Children over eight are unlikely to be disturbed by anything in this film.
Sexual references
Jane makes a flippant remark to a patronising aunt about how her sister will miss out ‘hot sex with strangers’ once she is married.
Alcohol, drugs and other substances
Several scenes depict people drinking alcohol. In one of these segments, Jane and Kevin are shown consuming large amounts of alcohol, until they are quite drunk.
Nudity and sexual activity
- Jane and Kevin begin kissing passionately in the car. While there are no graphic details, the audience is lead to understand that they have sex.
- Jane is shown in several scenes early in the film changing clothes in the back of a taxi, revealing bare legs and back, but nudity is implied, rather than explicit.
Product placement
None
Coarse language
There is some coarse language in this movie, including: boobs, asshole, bitch, what the hell and Oh God.
Ideas to discuss with your children
27 Dresses is an enjoyable romantic comedy directed by Anne Fletcher. This film is pitched at young females aged over 12, but may also be entertaining to older audiences.
You might like to talk to your children about some of the values in this movie, such as true love, loyalty, truth and fairness, and the negative consequences of being deceitful.