5. Julianne Potter - My Best Friend's Wedding
"My Best Friend's Wedding" is a golden example of that movie magic gloss, which can distract the viewer from the absurd. Like so many romantic comedy blockbusters before and after, the film takes the insane actions of its protagonist and fits them to a comedic backdrop. Julianne Potter is a single woman in her late twenties who made a pact with her best friend Michael that if they are both unmarried by 28, they will settle with one another. Weeks before this ultimatum date, Michael informs her that he is engaged to a woman he recently met, and this sets off Potter on a quest to stop the wedding because, all of a sudden, she realizes her undying love for him. Now the film does end with her learning a valuable lesson about best friends and letting people be happy including herself. However, the lengths of which she goes to try to stop her friend's wedding are a bit too crazy to not be a quality of character. Potter willingly becomes a bridesmaid, convinces Michael's fiancé to do karaoke in hopes that the reveal of her tone deafness will be a crushing turn off, and fakes her own engagement to instigate jealousy. The film is easily an inspiration for the complete anti-gloss "Young Adult", in which Charlize Theron's character finds out her high school sweetheart has a newborn baby, immediately rehashes her old feelings, and flies home to shamelessly destroy his family life. "Young Adult" is a great commentary on a film like "My Best Friend's Wedding", in that Theron's anti-hero is really just the personified id of Julianne Potter.