Set in the Hollywood Hills of Los Angeles, Spread is the amusing story of handsome, charming Nikki (Ashton Kutcher) who relies solely on his good looks to get by. Having no home, no job and few friends, he makes up for all this by sleeping with an excessive amount of women. He is a modern day, fun-loving, man-whore, sleeping his way through and into the lives of the rich and privileged.
He reaches the height of his career when attractive, middle-aged attorney Samantha (Anne Heche, Nip/Tuck) offers to ‘spread’ everything for him, securing him the material life he always wanted. Everything goes smoothly until he meets funny and cute waitress Heather (Margarita Levieva) who encourages Nikki to ‘conquer’ her as one of his trophies. Nikki succeeds, but when she visits him at Samantha’s house she mistakenly assumes it to be his. We discover that Heather is actually playing the same game as he is. Heather’s lies soon unravel and the two enjoy a life of crashing A-list parties until they start to fall in love – something they cannot reconcile with their decadent lifestyle.
From that point the film takes on the conventional plot of girl leaves boy, boy realises he’s in love, boy does everything to get girl back and, in this instance, girl is torn between love and money. The moral of the story seems to be that money isn’t everything, that some ‘playas’ may actually be capable of falling in love. Indeed, it is women who represent those who prefer money to true love. At any rate, there is little point in getting too deeply ‘philosophical’ on this issue, as the film clearly doesn’t. It’s an entertaining, superficial story that loses its edge as well as some rather disturbing scenes after the first 35 minutes.
Directed by David Mackenzie (Hallam Foe, Young Adam), Spread explores the temptations of sex and money and examines notions of happiness and self-fulfilment. The movie portrays the glamorous Hollywood and what the city offers to the beautiful and rich, but also the price Nikki has to pay to facilitate his lifestyle of free-riding. The picture is worth a look for Kutcher’s ability to make suspenders look incredibly hot and for a great performance from a stunning Anne Heche. However, as the film leaves its prestigious Hollywood surrounding behind in its second half, it also loses its sharpness.
