Something New

Name: Something New
Genre: Drama, Romance
Released: February 3, 2006
Duration: 99 min
Rating: 64
Cast: Golden Brooks, Sanaa Lathan, Simon Baker

2006

METASCORE

Generally favorable reviews based on 28 Critic Reviews

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USER SCORE

Generally favorable reviews based on 19 Ratings

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7.3

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7.3	User Score Generally favorable reviews based on 19 Ratings

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Something New

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Movie Details & Credits

Focus Features | Release Date: February 3, 2006 | PG-13

Starring: Golden Brooks, Sanaa Lathan, Simon Baker

Summary: A romantic comedy about finding love where its least expected. (Focus Features)

Director: Sanaa Hamri

Genre(s): Drama, Romance

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 99 min

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Critic Reviews

100

TV Guide Magazine Ken Fox

First-time feature director Sanaa Hamri's virtually perfect romantic comedy is a marvelous mix of brains and heart that confronts serious questions about race and dating with sensitivity, humor and enormous sex appeal. Read full review

Stephanie Zacharek

Something New is the perfect date movie, not only because it explores a range of suitably romantic sentiments, but because it's so canny sociologically, as well as being delightfully good-natured. Read full review

Carrie Rickey

Kenya and Bryan are both victims of racism and also guilty of it. But the colorful mosaic of their courtship is no downer like "Crash," but rather an upbeat account of expanding social and romantic possibilities in a world where women wear the suits and men speak the language of flowers. Read full review

Kimberley Jones

Manages the neat feat of feeling sweetly inevitable rather than boilerplate predictable. Read full review

Kevin Crust

The movie nicely captures the area around Baldwin Hills, is crisply written by Kriss Turner and portrays the upper-middle class black community seldom seen in mainstream TV and film. However, the characterizations, even the leads, rarely rise above archetypes. Read full review

Lisa Schwarzbaum

A shaky piece of work, with stumpy cinematography, choppy edits, speechy dialogue, and loose plotlines. And yet: There's an easygoing authenticity to the depiction of Kenya and her world that coexists with the picture's many weaknesses. Read full review

Wesley Morris

This is an inept and unsubtle romantic fantasy about how black people and white people don't mix. Read full review

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User Reviews

Lexx2u

Apr 19, 2011

Every time I see this movie I love it more. This is definitely a chick flick for black women who grew up middle to upper middle class. I loved the chemistry between the characters, the humor of two very different people falling in love who just happen to be of different races and SocioEvery time I see this movie I love it more. This is definitely a chick flick for black women who grew up middle to upper middle class. I loved the chemistry between the characters, the humor of two very different people falling in love who just happen to be of different races and Socio economic backgrounds. From the moment they meet to getting to know each other and experiencing new things the movie makes you laugh and think. The family dynamic reminds me of my friends and I who have only seen a ghetto/hood on television or the movies and do have brothers older and younger just like in this movie. Also the doting father and socially concious mom yep very realistic from a suburban view. There was no old 70 's or 80 's prejudicial point of views in the movie, and thank goodness there was no crazy angry black woman "Sista" mannerisms that black women haters like to use to parody black women. I wish the director would make a follow-up to this movie just to see how they did or at least get funding to do more movies like this. People who might not like this movie will have comments about the plot being unrealistic and those people I have to wonder what background experience is driving that point of view. But if you take the racial factor out of the movie, it is a really sweet love story. Unfortunately, black women today are stuck with Tyler Perry who continues to denigrate us in the pictures he makes. H… Expand

1 of 1 users found this helpful10

F_C

Dec 13, 2015

The movie was excellent. IMPORTANT: The review and "0" score by "joshC" should be removed - it blatantly plagIarizes the Boston Globe review by Wesley Morris and offers nothing new or original.

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

Laurn

Feb 20, 2006

really enjoyed it. covered material (racial issues from the black perspective) excellently.

1 of 1 users found this helpful

DavidJ.

Feb 4, 2006

I really liked this movie. This is the movie I wished Guess Who could have been. Being a white man in a relationship with a beautiful, intelligent, hard working black woman. This movie is what we have been waiting for for 17 year. My wife really loved the interaction with the girlfriends I really liked this movie. This is the movie I wished Guess Who could have been. Being a white man in a relationship with a beautiful, intelligent, hard working black woman. This movie is what we have been waiting for for 17 year. My wife really loved the interaction with the girlfriends and early scenes with Brian. I really liked the father's statement to Kenya in the privey. This was reminscent of a talk my wife's dad had with me.… Expand

1 of 1 users found this helpful

LynnW.

Feb 11, 2006

Great lead actors. A formula movie in many ways, but with a realness and naturalness to the characters that's often missing from romantic comedies.

1 of 1 users found this helpful

annbd

Dec 19, 2018

Something stupid and almost boring. An over-critical black woman has locked up in her bubble and does not want to get out of there. Eventually she did and take the risk to go out with terribly normal and and surprisingly patient white guy. That's all.

1 of 2 users found this helpful11

JoshC.

Jan 21, 2007

The success of Paul Haggis's "Crash" proved that the only way for an American movie to deal with the problem of race is to drop it on an audience's head like an anvil. "Something New" is a similarly blunt object. There's a profound way for the races to talk to each other (or The success of Paul Haggis's "Crash" proved that the only way for an American movie to deal with the problem of race is to drop it on an audience's head like an anvil. "Something New" is a similarly blunt object. There's a profound way for the races to talk to each other (or not to), but Hollywood doesn't seem to have figured it out. Instead, Kenya seems forced into racializing her frustrations at work, and Brian is made to appear insensitive for not wanting to hear her vent. This is a useful way to kick off a town-hall meeting. It's a terrible start for a love affair. Sanaa Hamri directed this movie (it's her first feature) and Kriss Turner wrote the screenplay, and neither will drum any logic into Kenya. Would a woman this professional and this together, raised by academics and educated at predominantly white institutions, blanch at the idea of dating a man of another race? Especially one this handsome, independent, and polite? There might be several plausible reasons for her not to date Brian, but the movie doesn't allow her to articulate them. The problem isn't just Kenya's. Her brother (Donald Faison) calls Brian "the help" and won't even shake his hand. Her mother (Alfre Woodard) is even haughtier. (The McQueens aren't the Huxtables; they're the Carringtons.) Were Brian black and Kenya named, I don't know, Paris, and if her family and friends were as rude to him, we'd be expected to find their behavior appalling. The movie's perceptions of black and white are so petty that race begins to seem like the stupidest hang-up in the world. Kenya is as chronically dissatisfied as a lot of ambitious people, which makes her dilemma rich with social comedy. But "Something New" takes forever to turn progressive. The audience is smarter than the movie right up to the end, when someone finally clears up the apparent mystery. "The boy is white," says Kenya's dad. "He's not a Martian." Great, now he tells us.… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful

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