Muffin Top: A Love Story

Professor Suzanne (Cathryn Michon) is fighting against today’s portrayal of women in advertising—super-slim and flawless. Yet her reflections on the widespread cult of thinness and beauty do not spare the bleached-blonde forty-year-old from insecurities about her own appearance, which is often presented in high heels and skin-tight suits. Especially when her husband leaves her for a younger, slimmer secretary who is pregnant with his child—of all times, while she is trying to start a family through artificial insemination. Convinced that her appearance is the cause of the breakup, Suzanne desperately sets out on a quest for external self-improvement. This goes spectacularly wrong, especially in a professional context, even if single life in L.A. seems to have its advantages. What Suzanne completely overlooks in the process is the romantic fact that her inner qualities have long since caught the eye of another man (David Arquette). “Hüftgold” is an over-the-top rom-com in the US comedy style, where everyone literally “gets a piece of the action,” but which nonetheless has its heart in the right place. “This entertaining comedy wraps its agenda—advocating for a more relaxed attitude toward one’s own body and fighting against media-driven pressure to self-optimize—in a somewhat formulaic plot, but still manages to entertain well thanks to its likable characters.” (Lexikon des Internationalen Films)