A Curiosity

Rating: 5/10 (25 April 2010)

This movie is currently knocking about on the HBO channels, rather like a fill-in for something more useful or entertaining. Set in L.A., it looks very much like a hundred or so other films made for TV recently that center on the "boy meets girl;boy is a jerk;boy loses girl;boy gets girl back;both wind up in lavish and tear-jerker wedding" formula. The central premise is such a creaky bromide that it has to depend on mostly decent production values to sustain the viewer's interest over the course of an hour or so with nothing better to watch.
One or two further observations are necessary. First, the idea that a young slacker in California real estate these days can lead the kind of life portrayed here is ridiculous on the face of it. Second, the character of the best friend is far too soft in contrast to his hard and cynical observations. And his Venice beach house with its expensive furnishings belie any reasonable assertion of poverty or even semi- poverty.
In short, the whole thing smacks of a TV reality-show concept within which a feel-good conclusion results after a series of obvious episodes involving standard clichés handed down from 18th-century Restoration stage comedies.
Been there, done that.