'Don't call me anymore!'

Rating: Null/10 (13 February 2014)

This is a hard movie to get into because the first few scenes are filled with foul language and young men talking dirty with each other and about sex, as their only focus seems to be getting the next one-night stand. They objectivise the young ladies at the night spot, usually arguing if she is a 'dime' (a '10') or not.
Writer/director/star is Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Jon. Set in New Jersey, his friends have named him 'Don Jon' because of his almost 100% success getting the woman of his choice into a cab then into his bed. He is totally stuck on himself and satisfying his own needs for bodybuilding and sex. But casual sex doesn't do it for him, he can only get totally consumed by watching porn. Even right after his most recent one-night stand.
But then he meets Scarlett Johansson as Barbara, in her tight red dress, but she spurns his advances. She leaves without giving him anything, no phone, no name, no sex. He is crushed. He considers her the most beautiful woman he has ever met. At the advice of a friend he finds a name, finds a Facebook profile, sends her a message, they meet for lunch.
But as his almost silent sister observes one day over an after-Mass family Sunday lunch, Barbara just wanted to control Jon, wanted him as her own project. He is a bartender so she gets him to take a class. She wants him to strive for more. And she tells him, "Never lie to me." As the movie trailer plainly shows, she catches watching porn one night, he swears it was just a thing that a friend sent, he would never do it again. But that was a lie, he was addicted, it was part of his superficial view of life and pleasure.
At his class he meets Julianne Moore as Esther, a woman with her own issues, and after a very 'cold' start they eventually form a type of unlikely friendship. She may be the key to helping Jon understand that the only way to fully immerse yourself into life is to immerse yourself into someone else, to really care for them and about them instead of just what you can get.
This of course is a basic message of happiness, but one that some people never learn.
It was good to see Tony Danza, so good in the old TV series "Taxi", in the perfect role as Jon's dad, Jon Sr. And Glenne Headly, who was so good in "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels", as his mother Angela. Brie Larson was his sister Monica, always there for Sunday Mass and lunch, but rarely speaking, usually texting. It was also good to see Rob Brown, so good in "Finding Forrester", as one of Jon's friends Bobby.
SPOILERS: In one last meeting with Barbara, where Jon tries to make amends, but does't, as she leaves she tells him "Don't call me anymore." But Jon and Esther have a quickie after class, he finds out she had recently lost her husband and son in a car wreck, and as the movie ends it appears that Jon may be finding some meaning in life through his relationship with her.