"Death Becomes Her" is an exceptional look at dark comedy done right. Dark comedy is one of the trickiest genres in movies today because if not done right, you have an extremely uneven film on your hands.<br /><br />"Death Becomes Her" is about aging in Hollywood which, according to Meryl Streep, is "illegal." "Death Becomes Her" is a fresh, original and satirical look at a classic and clichéd formula: growing old and the secret to eternal youth with a spin: it's effects on image-obsessed Hollywood. The strongest elements of this movie are the lively score, the award-winning special effects, and the highly enjoyable performances by Meryl Streep, Goldie Hawn and Bruce Willis.<br /><br />"Death Becomes Her" was Meryl Streep's first attempt at (dark) comedy and she outdoes even herself ("She-Devil") with an energetic, brassy, loud, and devilishly good performance reminiscent to a blonde Velma Kelly (Chicago)...who's afraid to get older. Streep makes playing Madeline, a woman more concerned with getting older than her pathetic life, look effortless. Goldie Hawn plays her arch-nemesis, Helen and she commands the role with class and humor. Hawn gets the most out of this role and keeps you interested and charmed at the same time. Bruce Willis is surprisingly very good at playing Ernest, the man caught between these two women, and we get to see him in a role out of the ordinary in which he departs from action star to emotional weakling. The way he inhabits the role is so natural and polished it adds to the movie and makes sense of other two leads who are fighting over him. <br /><br />The actors play off of each other and even though the script is lacking (and gives these characters very little to work with), it's these inspired performances that carry "Death".<br /><br />The biggest problem with this movie is that in the end you have no one to root for, no one to care about, which is the script's fault entirely. The script falls flat but picks itself up, thus building momentum; falling from consistency to inconsistency, which helps keep the interest and helps keep the story alive, but it develops too many problems too late into the film. Finally, when there's about a half hour left everything begins to build up again and the momentum keeps building at you're awaiting a "Bang!" ending, when, ironically, the ending turns out to be anti-climatic. In the end, the script is just too campy and Robert Zemeckis can't save the film.<br /><br />In "Death" there are some similarities to other Robert Zemeckis movies but "Death" doesn't live up to his other creations. It's a movie entirely in it's own category and requires you to overlook the faults and get lost in the spirited performances. "Death Becomes Her" cleverly and hilariously deals with some of our greatest concerns; death, hatred, insanity, beauty, immortality, and, gasp, growing older!<br /><br />Performances: A+<br /><br />Script: C+<br /><br />Special Effects: A<br /><br />Score: B+<br /><br />Overall Movie: B