Man About Town Review

Cast: Ben Affleck, Rebecca Romijn, Samuel Ball, Mike Binder, Gina Gershon, Adam Goldberg, Howard Hessman, Bai Ling, Jerry O'Connell, Kal Penn, Amber Valletta, Damien Dante Wayans, John Cleese
Director: Mike Binder
Screenplay: Mike Binder
Genre: Drama
Rated: M
Running Time: 96 minutes

Synopsis:
Top Hollywood agent Jack Giamoro (Ben Affleck) is doing a course in journal writing in the hope of somehow reconnecting to life and his failing marriage to former supermodel Nina (Rebecca Romijn). As Jack expresses his innermost thoughts under the tutelage of the sardonic Dr Primkin (John Cleese), he discovers more about himself than he wanted to know, bringing his career to the brink of ruin in the process.

My verdict:
Ignore the marketing of ‘Man About Town’ as an indie ensemble piece. When it works, and it doesn’t much, this is broad comedy - Hollywood satire of the most facile kind. Its savvy industry dialogue will have insiders rolling their eyes (to a colleague stating the obvious: 'Stop talking like a bit player in a Dick Wolf show!') but it does have its moments. At one point Jerry O’Connell, hamming it up as an overpaid screenwriter, brings his unknown actress wife (Amber Valletta) to meet with Jack. She insists on auditioning and turns up in a white skivvy to reenact Sharon Stone’s most notorious scene in ‘Basic Instinct’. Her performance is intercut with Jack dealing with his estranged wife and an escalating situation involving a tabloid journalist (Bai Ling, who’s outfits are as crazy as her performance). In another scene a group of agents go head to head with the tough staff of a Chinatown restaurant. The agents try some karate, only to find that the restaurant workers are actually good at karate.

If ‘Man About Town’ had stayed on this level it could have been a successful comedy in the vein of ‘Anchorman’ or ‘Airplane!’ but this is a film strangled at birth by pretensions to arty sensitivity. Put simply, it’s a disastrous attempt to replicate the ‘Jerry Maguire’ formula - scene for scene in some instances. While imitation is hardly a crime in Hollywood, there’s nothing more pathetic than a retread that misses the mark. Love him or loathe him, Tom Cruise did know what he was doing with ‘Jerry Maguire’ and here Ben Affleck goes to great lengths to prove it. Rebecca Romijn can’t measure up to Renee Zellweger on her worst day, while Jerry O’Connell is a completely token Cuba Gooding Jr substitute.

Alarmingly, this is not the only Cameron Crowe film brought to mind. At times the film descends into almost epic tragedy as Jack is left beaten and bloodied by an intruder, only to have painful dental reconstruction leave him with teeth like Bugs Bunny (or 'Tom Cruise’s retarded cousin', as the script astutely points out). This goes beyond black humour - it’s plumbing the bizarre depths of ‘Vanilla Sky’ territory, and why a director would want to do that is anyone’s guess. There are even a few touches of Wes Andersonesque quirkiness, mostly involving an aquarium. Usually risk-taking is to be applauded, no matter how unsuccessful the result, but ‘Man About Town’ is so by the numbers that its stylistic flourishes are a transparent bid for credibility and only add insult to injury.

Meanwhile some of the cast, such as Gina Gershon as an agent and Howard Hessman as Jack’s ailing father, are working to create actual performances (Oddly enough, director Mike Binder does okay too, also playing an agent). They really shouldn’t have bothered. Ben Affleck is a strange actor. You want to like him and sometimes he delivers. Here he is unconvincing, either in 'hard ass' or little boy lost mode. His temples may be touched up with distinguished grey but, when not randomly emoting, he really isn’t doing much. Affleck is just not the right choice for such a role. But then again, what actor would be right for this pastiche of clichés and mawkish sentimentality? Therein lies the dilemma.

Rating : **

Briony Kidd