“How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days” (and stay relevant for 20 years)
How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (and Keep Relevancy for 20 years)
Andie Anderson is living my dream. Fresh out of grad school, she’s working for a popular women’s magazine in New York City. She’s confident, kind and funny. And, of course, she’s a 2000s rom com heroine played by Kate Hudson — my ultimate aspiration.
When How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days premiered 20 years ago, I was five years old. I grew up watching rom coms and dreaming of having my own meet-cute with a Matthew McConaughey-esque ad executive (little did I know that in the age of Tinder, 10 days is actually a long time to talk to a guy). I’ve learned many great life lessons from romantic comedies, and this film is no exception.
It is a master class in blending romantic chemistry and timeless humor (that even trended on TikTok two decades later). However, watching in retrospect, it’s easy to feel put off by how callously women’s bodies are talked about at that time — a character insists she was broken up with because she was “too fat” or two women being referred to as “hips and lips.” Meanwhile, a shirtless Ben (McConaughey) is lusted after within the first seven minutes. But, the film also had triumphant moments for women empowerment that shouldn’t be negated.
In order to save her recently-dumped friend from embarrassment, Andie agrees to write her latest “how to” article as a reverse dating guide, titling the column: How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. Her plan is to reel the guy in and then “flip the switch” by becoming clingy, dramatic and whiny. This isn’t an easy task because Ben has been challenged by his coworker to make a woman fall in love with him in 10 days.
On date one, Andie is the quintessential cool girl. She has the right lines and knows all the tricks — including leaving her purse behind so Ben finds her Knicks tickets, securing a second date. But when Ben dismisses her work at Composure Magazine, she is quick to tell him that she has a master’s degree in Journalism from Columbia. While Andie wants to write about politics, the environment and foreign affairs, she works hard and cares about her job and coworkers.
Notably, the film never pits women against each other. In fact, Andie is a great friend. Especially to Michelle, played by Kathryn Hahn, who delivers some of the best comedic scenes in the movie. The comedic duo of Hahn and Hudson is so good that they recently starred together in Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. One of the many ways Andie attempts to ditch Ben (besides giving him a love fern, nicknaming his “member” Princess Sophia, and taking him to see Celine Dion,) is by having Hahn hilariously pretend to be a couples therapist.
While, yes, it’s funny when Andie changes Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain” to include Ben’s name and crashes his “boys night” poker game, it’s also amusing to see Ben get so pressed. Like, I don’t believe you actually despised that Celine Dion concert and are you really that freaked out from seeing a tube of Vagisil in your bathroom? I don’t know if the battle-of-the-sexes motif works as well in 2023 as we are beginning to become more enlightened on conversations surrounding gender, but How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days pulls it off just as well as Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy.
The success of the film really does come down to Hudson and McConaughey. The way they can go from hating each other one minute to falling in love the next is seamless and convincing. On February 6, the stars reunited on an Instagram livestream to discuss the film. “When you went one direction, I went with you,” Hudson said in the recorded video. “But then I would be like, ‘I’m gonna throw him off a little bit. Let’s see what happens if I do a sharp right.”
It might seem like a low bar, but Andie having a full-fledged personality with a variety of interests and a sense of humor makes her a progressive love interest by film standards. And while it’s not without faults, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days is one of the most forward-thinking rom coms of its time. Now that it’s been added to Netflix, it’s time for a rewatch.
is an arts journalism and communications graduate student and a contributor for The NewsHouse.
