Let me tell you what's wrong with most chick flicks: They're hard on real chicks.

Here we are, overworked and stressed, between relationships or roughing one out, jilted and depressed or stable and bored. What we want is a little excitement, some peace and maybe a tiny bit of vindication. And granted, the chick flick typically gives us all that — but usually all that does is make things worse. What with all those thin, gorgeous characters and their spacious apartments, idealized (if eventually unfaithful) boyfriends and clever sidekick girlfriends, not to mention the kind of wardrobe (size XS of course) that Lindsay Lohan would steal in a flash, you wind up feeling more damaged than healed.

But "The Hottest State" is that rare find: a chick flick that puts chicks first. It's not empowering or ennobling, it never gets preachy or tells us to shape up and move on or some such dire pep aesthetic. It's just a simple, shallow love story where two ordinary people meet, have a brief relationship and break up — without much depth, sense or reason. And this time it's the guy who bears the brunt of the pain and humiliation, who commits himself hard, only to get burned down to ashes. Who would have thought that an ex-chick predator like Hawke would be batting for the other team.