Good Advice

Good Advice is no great film and only earns a middling star rating, but it is nonetheless surprising that the film was never shown in Danish cinemas, for it is actually a rather spirited and entertaining comedy.

Charlie Sheen plays the cynical stockbroker Ryan Turner, so that one cannot help thinking of his role in "Wall Street". Ryan's girlfriend is the beautiful and every bit as insensitive Cindy Styne, who, what is more, runs the advice column at a small, ambitious newspaper. The young female editor-in-chief Page Hensen is rather dissatisfied with Cindy's efforts, however, which are also reflected in a very small number of letters to the column.

All this comes to an abrupt end, however, when the unscrupulous Ryan tries his hand at insider trading. It turns out that he has been lured into a trap by the newspaper magnate Barry Sherman, with whose wife Ryan is having an affair. In no time at all Ryan has neither job nor girlfriend, for Cindy runs off with a Brazilian millionaire.

Ryan is desperate for a job, and since the letters to Cindy still have to be answered, he turns up at Page's office and asks to take the letters home to his girlfriend, who is supposedly ill at home. At first Ryan is at least as talentless as his ex-girlfriend, but as it gradually dawns on him that a great deal is actually at stake for the people who write to the column, he begins to put more effort into the work.

Can Ryan find his humanity? The answer is yes, and with the column's success, the newspaper's circulation rises, along with the attention paid to the mysterious Cindy Styne. How long can Ryan deceive the world? The biggest problem is actually that he has fallen in love with his editor, and there are signs that Page returns his feelings, but she still believes that Ryan is Cindy's boyfriend. It will not be easy for Ryan to wriggle out of the complications.