Life or Something Like It

Life or Something Like It
Film poster
Directed by	Stephen Herek
Produced by	John Davis Arnon Milchan Toby Jaffe Chi-Li Wong
Written by	John Scott Shepherd Dana Stevens
Starring	Angelina Jolie Edward Burns Stockard Channing Christian Kane Tony Shalhoub
Music by	David Newman
Cinematography	Stephen H. Burum
Editing by	Trudy Ship
Studio	Regency Enterprises Davis Entertainment New Regency
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	April 26, 2002
Running time	103 min.
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$40,000,000
Box office	$16,872,671

Life or Something Like It is a 2002 romantic comedy film directed by Stephen Herek. The film focuses on television reporter Lanie Kerrigan (Angelina Jolie) and her quest to find meaning in her life. The original music score was composed by David Newman. The film's tagline is: "Destiny is what you make of it."

Plot

Lanie Kerrigan (Angelina Jolie), a successful reporter for a Seattle television station interviews a self-proclaimed prophet, Jack (Tony Shalhoub), to find out if he really can predict football scores. Instead, Prophet Jack not only predicts the football score, and that it would hail the next day, but also that she would die in seven days, meaning the following Thursday. When his first two prophecies turn out to be correct, Kerrigan panics and again meets with Jack and asks him for another prophecy so that she could prove it wrong; which would imply uncertainty of her death. Jack tells her that there will be a relatively significant earthquake in San Francisco at 9:06 am, she hopes that it would be wrong but again it also becomes reality. Now Lanie becomes sure for her upcoming death and forced to reevaluate her life.

The remainder of the storyline, which runs for the week of the prophecy, revolves around her attempts at introspection. She seeks consolation in her famous baseball player boyfriend Cal Cooper (Christian Kane), and in her family, but finds little there. Her lifelong ambition, that of appearing on network television begins to look like a distant dream. In her desperation, she commits professional blunders, but ends up finding support in an unlikely source, her archenemy, the cameraman Pete Scanlon (Edward Burns), with whom she once had casual sex; he introduces her to a new approach to life. Pete tells her to live every moment of her life and to do whatever she always wanted to do. Lanie implements Pete's advice; she moves in with Pete for a day, he introduces her to his son Tommy (Jesse James Rutherford) who lives with his mother who had separated with Pete, they spends a whole day together with Tommy; that night they sleep together for the second time. The next day Lanie receives an opportunity for a job she always dreamed of in New York; she asks Pete to come with her, but he declines and tells her that her appetite for success and fame will never end. Lanie sadly leaves for New York. Pete meets Jack and tells him how wrong he is, as Lanie got the job which Jack foretold she would not get. But Jack explains that he was right as Lanie will never be able to get the job as she'll die before it begins; he again gives a prophecy of a death of a famous former baseball player in a plane crash. Pete receives a news for the death of a same person, whose death was foretold by Jack; he tries to call Lanie to warn her. But when he doesn't reach her, he also flies to New York. Lanie, unconcerned with Jack's prophecy, interviews her idol, famous media personality Deborah Connors (Stockard Channing), which receives huge television ratings. Lanie is offered a better opportunity but she declines as now she knows what is worthwhile in her life - she goes to Pete in Seattle. Outside in the street a police officer gets into a conflict with a man, who shoots a bullet into the air. Pete tries to warn Lanie across the street, but she is shot in the crossfire. Luckily, Lanie survives, and Pete tells her in the hospital that he has loved her since the first time he saw her; Lanie says she loves him, too. Later, Pete, Lanie and Tommy watch Cal's baseball game, where Lanie (in a voiceover) tells viewers that one part of her has died - the part which didn't know how to live a life.

KOMO-TV

The majority of the movie was shot on location in Seattle, Washington although portions were filmed in downtown Vancouver. The TV station in the movie, KQMO, was actually real-life Seattle TV station KOMO-TV (the KOMO logo was altered on the set of KOMO 4 News and on several of KOMO's news vehicles, in addition to a few mic flags).

Several KOMO personalities make cameo appearances; among them are longtime anchors Dan Lewis and Margo Myers (the latter moved to KIRO-TV in January 2005), weather anchor and Front Runners host Steve Pool, and weekend weather anchor Theron Zahn. Other KOMO personalities who made brief cameo appearances include People Helper John Sharify, and reporter Michelle Esteban.

Additionally, Vancouver news anchors Pamela Martin and Jill Krop, at the time both employed with BCTV, appeared briefly in scenes shot in the BCTV studios.

Main cast

Actor	Role
Angelina Jolie	Lanie Kerrigan
Edward Burns	Pete Scanlon
Tony Shalhoub	Prophet Jack
Christian Kane	Cal Cooper
James Gammon	Pat Kerrigan
Melissa Errico	Andrea
Stockard Channing	Deborah Connors
Gregory Itzin	Dennis
Veena Sood	Doctor

Reception

The movie received negative reviews from critics, maintaining only a 27% rating from Rotten Tomatoes. Life or Something Like It was also a flop at the box office, grossing only $17 million worldwide and failed to bring back its $40 million budget. Jolie's performance in the film earned her a Golden Raspberry Award nomination for Worst Actress.

External links

• Life or Something Like It at the Internet Movie Database
• Life or Something Like It at AllRovi
• Life or Something Like It at Rotten Tomatoes