If star power alone was enough to launch a movie, then “Valentine’s Day” would be out of this world. Unfortunately, this romantic comedy had trouble getting off the ground.

“Valentine’s Day” featured an A-list ensemble of actors portraying characters experiencing love and heartache whose lives somehow all intertwine.

Hmmm, this sounds somewhat familiar.

Yes, that’s right - an ensemble of big name actors starring in a romantic comedy was released around Valentine’s Day last year, as well. That movie was titled “He’s Just Not That Into You” and also happened to feature Bradley Cooper.

To be fair though, while it’s true that the theme of romance in the lives of characters that all interlock is a big feature in both movies, the plots are different. That may be because “He’s Just Not That Into You” had a plot and succeeded more as a film whereas “Valentine’s Day” is more of an assortment of clips taken out of a bunch of romantic comedies to form this hodgepodge of a film.

The romantic girl inside me really wanted to love this movie, and parts of it I really did, but unfortunately, every time I started to connect to a character’s story, I was thrown into another story and another story and so on and so forth. In fact, many of the stories were quite enjoyable but just weren’t given enough time to develop more.

Since the movie is so diluted by all the storylines, my synopsis of the film will have to be as well. And since it would be hard to describe the film without revealing a bunch of spoilers, I’ll just talk about what kind of characters are in the film and who they are portrayed by.

The film takes place over the course of Valentine’s Day; during that time frame, we see characters break up, make up and begin romances. In the film, we have best friends Jennifer Garner and Ashton Kutcher who are each trying to be happy in their own respective relationships. Then there are the puppy love characters (Taylor Swift and Taylor Lautner, and Carter Jenkins and Emma Roberts).

There’s also the older, still-in-love couple (Shirley MacLaine and Hector Elizondo). There are also many other characters involved in side plots that feature actors like Julia Roberts, Jessica Alba, Jessica Biel, Jamie Foxx, Topher Grace, Patrick Dempsey and Anne Hathaway.

The people who created “Valentine’s Day” probably thought to themselves that they had the perfect formula for creating a big box office success. Big stars + romantic comedy + releasing it Valentine’s Day weekend + calling it “Valentine’s Day” = Big money. And they were right. At the Saturday matinee I attended, tickets sold out and box office estimates from Friday show the film grossing $15 million and is expected to gross $50 million total over the weekend.

I wish the makers of this film focused on a couple storylines to give them more time for development. They could have made a teen movie with all the high school characters, or maybe a film about best friends Kutcher and Garner’s characters, or a film about small-town boy Grace and adult phone entertainment talent Hathaway or films about all the other characters whose stories relate, too.

The point is: These could have all been potentially good stories to tell in their own film but all were lost within this one movie.

I don’t think that spending the extra cash to see “Valentine’s Day” in theaters and enduring the crowded seating is necessary. I recommend renting this film just for the star power and some of the stories featured. Or maybe it would just be better to pop in “He’s Just Not That Into You.”

By Jenna Rummer