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BY MAGGIE SCOTT

Weddings are getting a bad rap. Commercialized into costly extravaganzas, ceremonies meant to celebrate and sanction the civil and sacred joining of two people have turned into spectacles that have less to do with love and more to do with impressing people. Planning them can turn women into bridezillas and turn men off. Still, the fascination with weddings has not diminished and continues to be popular with filmmakers as a standard hook for a continuing stream of movies featuring weddings as part of the story. “27 Dresses” has a bit of bait-and-switch going on.

Director Anne Fletcher and writer Aline Brosh McKenna make you think you’re going to get the inside scoop on a woman who craves the emotional high of a wedding so much she’s been willing on 27 occasions to wear a gown destined for most sane persons’ worst-dressed-lists as a bridesmaid for what seems an unbelievably large group of friends.

Jane Nichols (Katharine Heigl) is a capable assistant for a successful, environmentally savvy outdoor outfitter (Edward Burns). While others are tying the knot all around her, Jane is on the shelf waiting for her boss to see her as more than a loyal Girl Friday.

True believer in romance and happily-ever-after, Jane’s favorite column in the New York Journal Style section is the weekly Vows feature by Malcolm Doyle (James Marsden). While on assignment for yet another “colorful, upbeat” piece, Malcolm, going by his real name of Kevin, meets Jane, right after she’s been knocked off her feet by a bridal bouquet.

Knocking Kevin head-over-heels, Jane has trouble relating to a man who quotes, “love is gentle, love is kind; love means slowly losing your mind.” Pegging him as a cynic, Jane resists his romantic overtures of flowers and cute defacing of her planner with his name scribbled on every Saturday.

Unexpectedly, Jane’s prospects of winning George’s heart dim dramatically when her sexy sister, Tess (Malin Akerman), arrives from L.A. Wasting no time, Tess sets her sight on a dazzled George and suspiciously proclaims a devotion to vegetarian food, hiking, kids and dogs.

Soon, it’s not hard to smell the orange blossoms and hear strains of “O, Promise Me.” Naturally, the heartbroken Jane will plan the details and be the maid of honor. And, Kevin will write up the storybook romance, but not before he gathers research on Jane for a secret investigative piece on what makes a woman the bridesmaid, never the bride.

Jane has a painful epiphany when she sees the evidence of her sister’s selfishness and sees splashed across the front of the Journals’ Style section herself decked out in the ridiculous dresses for Kodak moments she seems destined never to experience for herself.

Heigl is irresistibly fetching, no matter what unfashionable outfit she’s wearing, uninspiring dialogue she’s saying or undignified (think drunken karaoke) action she’s gamely committing.

There’s not much else about this lamely written work to recommend a walk down the movie theatre aisle. A Twentieth Century Fox release of a Spyglass Entertainment presentation of a Birnbaum/Barber production, rated PG-13.
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