by Karyn L. Beach

I think I need a Red Bull or maybe a big cup of coffee or even a Mountain Dew. All I know is that I need something. I wasn't sleepy or tired when I walked into Over Her Dead Body, but I'll be damned if that movie didn't just suck all the energy out of me. Over Her Dead Body? How about Over My Drooping Eyelids?

As the film opens, we find Kate (Eva Longoria-Parker), a bitchy bridezilla, in top form on her 'special day.' A crisis looms when she notices a problem with the ice sculpture. It's supposed to be an angel, but it has no wings!! Before she can work herself up into a frothy frenzy, the sculpture falls off the truck, and directly on her. A dead Kate soon learns that angels really don't have wings! Meanwhile, back on Earth her fiance, Henry (Paul Rudd) has spent an entire year without her and is still in mourning. His flighty sister Chloe (Lindsay Sloane) convinces him to see a psychic (Lake Bell). Of course, Chloe doesn't want to rely on Ashley's psychic abilities. So to help the matter along, Chloe gives Ashley Kate's old journal so she can use Kate's personal information to convince Henry that his former fiancee wants him to move on. Of course, Ashley falls for Henry and much to Ashley's chagrin, Kate really begins to appear and talk to her, only she doesn't want her betrothed to move on. You see, Kate is convinced that it's her final mission on Earth to keep them apart.

If I want to see Longoria-Parker play a shrill, selfish shrew, I'll watch Desperate Housewives for free. The writing is better and so is the supporting cast. Paul Rudd (which in this case rhymes with dud) plays Henry so low-key and laid-back that you'd think Henry was as dead as Kate. Lake Bell? I guess they're trying to do some sort of Sandra Bullock thing with her but it doesn't work. Sandra has charisma and charm. Lake? Well... Lake Placid comes to mind, and how much fun is it to sit there and watch a placid lake?

Jason Biggs has a supporting role as Ashley's obligatory 'gay friend' and character actor Stephen Root, who is a reliably funny in everything from Office Space to Dodgeball to King of the Hill is given absolutely nothing to do in his very small supporting role. I didn't laugh once, not even a chuckle. Several people laughed at a fart joke, but there's always someone who will laugh at a bodily function so that's not saying much.

I'm going to take a nap, just thinking about this movie is making me drowsy.