text: (Entertainment Weekly) -- How are the elements of the charming, traditional romantic comedy "The Proposal" like the checklist of a charming, traditional bride? Let me count the ways ... 
  
  Ryan Reynolds wonders if marrying his boss, Sandra Bullock, is a good thing in "The Proposal." 
  
  Something old: The story of a haughty woman and an exasperated man who hate each other -- until they realize they love each other -- is proudly square, in the tradition of rom-coms from the 1940s and '50s. Or is it straight out of Shakespeare's 1590s? 
  
  Sandra Bullock is the shrew, Margaret, a pitiless, high-powered New York book editor first seen multitasking in the midst of her aerobic workout (thus you know she needs to get ... loved). Ryan Reynolds is Andrew, her put-upon foil of an executive assistant, a younger man who accepts abuse as a media-industry hazing ritual. 
  
  And there the two would remain, locked in mutual disdain, except for Margaret's fatal flaw -- she's Canadian. (So is "X-Men's" Wolverine; I thought our neighbors to the north were supposed to be nice.) 
  
  Margaret, with her visa expired, faces deportation and makes the snap executive decision to marry Andrew in a green-card wedding. It's an offer the underling can't refuse if he wants to keep his job. (A sexual-harassment lawsuit would ruin the movie's mood.) 
  
  OK, he says. But first comes a visit to the groom-to-be's family in Alaska. Amusing complications ensue. 
  
  Something new: The chemical energy between Bullock and Reynolds is fresh and irresistible. In her mid-40s, Bullock has finessed her dewy America's Sweetheart comedy skills to a mature, pearly texture; she's lovable both as an uptight careerist in a pencil skirt and stilettos, and as a lonely lady in a flapping plaid bathrobe. 