Even if you have mixed feelings about The Help, there's a good reason to applaud the film's success. Supposedly, it's confirmed the box office viability of a radical new genre: "Chick flicks" with a bit of substance.

In "films that will be endlessly compared to Bridesmaids solely because they contain enough female characters to pass the Bechdel test" news, L!fe Happens, a "raunchy female buddy comedy" recently premiered at the Los Angeles Film Festival and is currently seeking theatrical distribution.

She stresses that she likes movies that are "very grounded in reality but still maintain their comedy," and notes that her latest, Going The Distance, is "not a movie where the female lead is in Christian Louboutins and thousand-dollar suits."

Last Friday at 6:05pm sharp, Deadspin editor A.J. Daulerio — an unabashed fan of chick flicks and rom-coms — walked into a theater to see Eat Pray Love. This is what he saw.

You may know that Angelina's part in Salt was written for Tom Cruise. But as As Jay A. Fernandez writes: "No actress in Hollywood history has been able to chisel out the supremacy Jolie has in a male-dominated genre."

Oooh, ladies, watch out! This (unofficial/fake?) Expendables trailer goes out of its way to "fight back" against Julia Roberts and chick flicks everywhere. Basically this film is so manly that merely thinking about it will engorge penises and destroy vaginas.

Lady-centric comedy flick You Again comes out in the fall, so we have plenty of time to ponder whether we love or loathe the premise. What we do like: Jamie Lee Curtis! Sigourney Weaver! Mother-lovin' Betty White! [ONTD, YouTube]

Few have tried to defend today's romantic comedies, maybe because in that category, money does most of the talking. Still, here is producer Lynda Obst striking out on their behalf — and, apparently, against New York Times critic Manohla Dargis.

The following is a desperate plea to any curious souls who might think going to see the star-over-studded "romantic" "comedy" Valentine's Day this weekend is a decent idea. It's too late for me, but you can still save yourselves.

Dear John, which opens today, is based on a Nicholas Sparks book in which young lovers (Amanda Seyfried and Channing Tatum) keep their relationship alive by writing to each other. Sadly, critics did not love it, "like McAdams loves Gosling."