“Angelina Jolie’s ‘Life, or Something Like It’ Rises in Netflix Rankings, Showing Continued Popularity Among Mainstream Viewers”

In the streaming era, the sign of star power may not be the ability to draw people to theaters, but to have them watch your biggest flops on Netflix. Angelina Jolie’s 2002 film Life, or Something Like It, which only grossed $14 million then, has been on Netflix’s Top 10 charts for over a week. This film fared slightly worse than Solaris, a sci-fi movie from the same year that received an “F” from CinemaScore, making it one of Jolie’s least successful wide releases in her 25-year career.

Despite its lackluster performance, Jolie’s enduring fame is evident. It takes star power to attract viewers to a movie like Life, or Something Like It, which follows the story of Lanie Kerrigan, played by Jolie, a TV reporter whose life takes a strange turn after a homeless man predicts her death. The movie, resembling a cheap Sundance life-affirmer, fails to engage significantly, relying on elongated scenes to barely fill its 103-minute runtime.

Directed by Stephen Herek, known for creating undemanding content like last year’s holiday rom-com Our Little Secret, Life, or Something Like It lacks substance beyond showcasing Jolie’s presence. The film struggles to sustain a meaningful narrative, revolving around Lanie’s soul-searching journey prompted by a homeless man’s predictions. Despite its shortcomings, the movie manages to captivate viewers, possibly resonating with the relaxed and undemanding appeal of content on platforms like Netflix.

In any case, it’s an artifact from a time when Jolie was less scarce on movie screens; though this was her only 2002 release, it was sandwiched between two Tomb Raider installments, and part of a post-Oscar period where she appeared in nine movies over the course of five years. These days, she takes multi-year breaks in between projects – and as it happens, her newest movie is on Netflix, too. Maria, in which she plays opera singer Maria Callas in her last days, premiered on the service last fall, on its way to a presumed Oscar nomination, which did not materialize, suggesting that maybe even Oscar voters watching a star play another star are nostalgic for earlier Angelina.

Interestingly, both Life and Maria feature Jolie as a woman of some renown (moreso in the latter, obviously) re-examining herself with greater awareness of her mortality. It’s a worthy subject for an actress who has seemed increasingly regal, sometimes downright remote, in recent years. Her signature post-2010 role is as the misunderstood lady wizard Maleficent, a slight shift from her 2000s interest in action heroines and/or noble suffering. Her Maria Callas is more knowing, more rueful, even playful, about her losses, even if that’s to disguise a certain degree of wounded ego. The movie plays with Jolie’s imperious glamour as well as the slyness that made her such an alluring figure in youth, before she so often played some form of superhuman. For that matter, Lanie the careerist reporter certainly has a more approachable rom-com vibe than whoever that Salt character was, even if that vibe feels profoundly more effortful when Jolie isn’t beating the hell out of people.

So what’s the mainstream Jolie canon, anyway, after 25 years in the spotlight? What are Netflix viewers hoping for when they stumble into Life, or Something Like It? Girl, Interrupted belongs in the Jolie pantheon, for sure; it won her an Oscar. Mr. & Mrs. Smith isn’t a great movie (honestly it’s the rare instance where the TV show is better), but it will live forever as a particular image of the eventually-fraught relationship between Jolie and Brad Pitt. Maleficent probably counts. Tomb Raider and Salt were hits, though they don’t feel as well-loved as the Harrison Ford movies they resemble. Part of Jolie’s appeal is that her mystique has managed to consistently transcend her actual movies. Maybe it’s that amorphous quality to Jolie’s stardom – the globally famous megastar in search of the right vehicle – that’s led fans to circle back to this mostly-wrong one.

Jesse Hassenger (@rockmarooned) is a writer living in Brooklyn podcasting at www.sportsalcohol.com. He’s a regular contributor to The A.V. Club, Polygon, and The Week, among others.