Humpday (Friday, July 17, 2009) (94)

Somehow this movie currently has some buzz - from a few positive reviews and from being a darling at Sundance (from what I understand). And yet it's not a good movie. The idea is sorta simple and dumb, where two college friends meet after several years in the real world - one is married and has become a 'square', while the other is a wild vagabond and artist. When they meet they decide that for an 'art project' they will have sex together on camera - but because they are both straight, it's not gay and it's art. Or something like that. The married dude gets his wife upset by this (no surprise), but tells her that he 'doesn't know why, but it means a lot to' him. We never really find out why that is either.

This is a teeny tiny movie with a cast of amateur actors - who are really not good at their craft. At times it felt like I was watching a painful high school play - or a film school production (with low grade production values). The script is also terrible, with characters making irrational decisions that work only in a scripted scene and would never happen in life. The direction, by Lynn Shelton (who previously edited the mediocre 'Diggers'), is amateurish and uninspired at best.

Mostly the film was dull. After the two guys decide to have sex together, they spend the next 45 minutes talking about it and figuring out how best to do it. At best, with a good script, this would be thought provoking or interesting. But here, it's just two loathsome asses who talk about their salad days in college and try to out-masculine the other by not being too *gay* as they screw each other.

I would have much preferred they cut to the chase and just did it quickly rather than drawing it out the way it happened.

Stars: 1 of 4