TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

GamerTab That was an excellent one.

Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

WillSushyMedia This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Amy Adler Sam (Matthew Broderick) works in a gourmet food shop in New York City. Of course, he really wants to be a chef, but this job will do for now. However, the pay is not great, making it necessary for him to live with a small pack of roommates. He is also still pining for an eccentric wannabe-actress named Pastel (Jeanne Tripplehorn). One day, he spies a slice of salvation in the newspaper. There is a nice apartment for rent in Manhattan, but only for a couple of nights a week. That's fine with Sam, for the price is right and he can have peace, quiet, and the occasional date with a lady. Ellen (Annabella Sciorra) also sees the ad and is desperate for some time away from her inconsiderate husband. She signs up for two of the days, with plans to pursue her interest in painting. The third tenant is the owner. Brian (Kevin Anderson), an Ivy league stockbroker/sleazebag who wants a place to hang out with his male buds, away from his own domineering fiancé (Justine Bateman). Soon, Sam builds a nice plant holder for Ellen and leaves her some great leftovers. However, through a mixed communication, she believes it is Brian who has done these acts, and she contemplates making a pass at him, despite her marital status. Will the lives of these three people remain separate or will circumstances allow them to meet, even though they are never at the apartment on the same days? This is a nice film with a clever story and script. Only in the Big Apple, I suppose, would you find folks willing to rent a place for only two nights a week. The cast is terrific, with Broderick, especially, giving a very funny and touching performance. As for the costumes, sets and production values, they are great, resulting in a movie that looks mighty nice. If you are a romantic comedy fan, you can't miss this one! It's fresh plot elements and well-drawn characters make it a welcome find in the world of light-hearted love stories. Yet, even if you are not a regular romcom viewer, the film still has some funny situations and universal themes that make it a diverting watch for most anyone.

Old_Abe THE NIGHT WE NEVER METSam (Matthew Broderick) is the reasonable man in a crazy urban world, the man of thoughtfulness and refined taste in a landscape of Leroy Neiman paintings and beer commercials. The guy would sooner cook for an hour over a hot stove than say `supersize it.'By day he's a store clerk in an upscale gourmet eatery, and these scenes raise a smile, especially for anyone who's visited the actual chain in New York City -- the portrayal isn't far off from the reality. Our man is besieged by hoards of customers who want their imported French cheese cut to impossibly exact standards. His efforts to remain outwardly polite (while you know he'd like to take the cleaver to the relentless clientele) are pretty funny, and will warm the hearts of clerks everywhere. In general, Broderick is in good form and provides the movie with most of whatever lightness it possesses.Sciorra's lovelorn dental hygienist, Ellen, is fine enough, too, and her unknowing interaction with our cheese-slicing hero shows some hopeful chemistry, and you may begin to feel you want to see these two get together.One of the main competitors for our lady's affections, a stockbroker (Kevin Anderson), is played as caricature: he's the beer swilling frat-boy whose idea of after-sex sensitivity is flipping on the football game. He's kind of funny at times, but the movie might be stronger if he was written or acted for us to like him more, instead of having us merely recognize him as the flat-out `wrong' guy in comparison to Broderick's sensitive man. Think of John Candy in Splash, taking a cigarette and beer can to the racquetball game; we know his lifestyle is not the one our hero should emulate, but we can't help but be charmed by the likeable goon. Whereas this character is merely a goon, and pretty unlikable all around.While it's a nice enough light movie for the first half, for me the story was somewhat derailed by its unbelievable (Hollywood) presentation of sex and adultery. (SPOILER AHEAD, skip to next paragraph.) When Ellen returns home after an evening's misadventures, she is naturally faced with the questioning husband (Michael Mantell). Quickly admitting her own indiscretion, she then immediately turns the situation around, demanding to know why the guy had gone ahead and bought a house without discussing it. Granted, it's a valid issue, and granted, many people use this countering maneuver in arguments. What's unbelievable is what happens next: the guy starts responding to her question, addressing the house-issue in a quiet, thoughtful manner. WHOA. You'd be hard pressed to find a married person in the world who, when faced with his/her partner's totally unexpected adultery, would be ready to address anything so calmly. The guy would surely be bouncing off the walls, or else crushed into silence and tears - but see, then we might actually feel for the poor schnook, and we'd see Sciorra's character in a poor light. And since that particular audience reaction doesn't serve the romantic comedy, the story tries to sneak around it. You may start to feel that, like the husband, you're being taken.Further dissatisfaction is just around the corner in the ending. We realize this is where misunderstandings will get sorted out, and our couple will finally see a clear path to one another. We want the satisfaction of rooting for them. But it's marred by another unbelievable character reaction, followed by an abrupt conclusion that feels rushed and forced, too easy and unearned. You may feel as though the movie's cheating on you again...Anyway if you catch it on cable I recommend the gourmet market scenes. Maybe we'll all be more understanding of the overworked clerks in this great land of ours. :)

stills-6 Great performances highlight this small story, which has a great hook and some forgivable flaws. The main themes of communication and isolation are given time to flesh themselves out in three separate stories that center around a shared apartment. I like the pacing in this film, it's slow enough to wrap itself around the story, but not so slow as to drag.The three main female characters are all good, especially Tripplehorn as Pastel, the avant-garde artist and pseudo girlfriend of Broderick. I've never seen her do any better with a character. Broderick has a curious role to play as a man who is tolerant of others up to a point (like his view of Sciorra's illogical behavior), but still has the serenity to offer marital advice to a woman who has just put him through a frustrating case of coitus interruptus. Sciorra's character is more problematic - she has a definite fear-aggression streak that gets tempered somewhat by the end, but there's also a good deal of "tough chick" bravado in her performance that makes it interesting.I wasn't completely convinced by all of the transformations in the final ten minutes of the movie, but it ties things up neatly enough so you don't feel cheated and leaves enough room for the characters to grow further after the final shot.

DoryO Matthew Broderick and Annabella Sciorra are people you actually care aobut in this film -- the others are over-the-top caricatures: wild-boy stock brokers, food snobs at Dean & Deluca, flaky performance artist sexpot, nosy elderly neighbors, vegan blind date, etc.Fun stuff.