Keeping the Faith (2000) Reviewed by Eugene Novikov http://www.ultimate-movie.com/ Member: Online Film Critics Society
Starring Edward Norton, Ben Stiller, Jenna Elfman. Directed by Edward Norton. Rated PG-13.
I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that Keeping the Faith has one of the best romantic comedy premises in recent years. The idea is just brimming with potential and at the hands of two great actors there shouldn't have been any problems following through on it. Unfortunately, just when the movie needs insight and originality, the script eagerly turns to sentimental conventions that have long worn out their welcome in movies past. This is a movie with a fantastic set-up but absolutely no payoff.
Edward Norton directs himself and Ben Stiller as two best friends whose lives have led them in the same direction but on different paths. Brian Finn (Norton) and Jacob Schram (Stiller) have known each other since grade school. Now, in their late 20's, they're still pals except that Jacob has become a Rabbi and Brian a Catholic priest. They've spent the last few years trying to bring their religions back into pop culture. Since leather jackets didn't work, they're now trying to form a karaoke club.
Their lives are routine until Brian receives word that Anna Riley, a girl they adored as children, is coming back to New York to visit them. They go to the airport to greet her, complete with a sign that proclaims "Anna Banana" to bring back a childhood joke. The reunion is jubilant, as the three have no problem getting back to the kind of banter that permeated their relationship when they were kids.
But things don't remain that simple for long. Brian, bound by his vow of chastity and having been bothered little by temptation so far, begins to fantasize about Anna and struggle with his religion. Meanwhile, Anna and Jacob begin a more intimate relationship, but although Jacob is not sworn to celibacy, his parents, his congregation and his community all expect him to marry a nice Jewish girl and a relationship with Anna is unlikely to get him the promotion to Head Rabbi he so desperately wants.
There's some good stuff here. Stiller and Norton are both wonderful actors with the ability to breathe life into the most mundane dialogue. Jenna Elfman, too, is a great comic talent -- heretofore woefully underused (and no, EdTV doesn't count) and now surprisingly promising. The script, by first-timer Stuart Blumberg, has intermittent laughs and a few slight insights into interfaith relationships. But thanks to (in all probability) some clueless studio execs, all of that adds up to exactly zilch.
The ending is a gigantic cop-out. What began as a seriously funny comedy about the intermingling of love and faith ends as stupidly sappy chunk of drivel, reverting back to that old Hollywood mentality that if the protagonists of a love story start getting really lucky, things all of a sudden start going their way, all the characters turn out to have good intentions and at the end everything is just perfect that the audience will walk out grinning stupidly. That's only sometimes true. You have to have the right set-up, establish the right mood for that kind of ending. If it's out of the blue, you get something like Keeping the Faith -- a movie so careful not to offend that it quickly polishes any provocativeness off with an unnatural happy ending.
At a running time of well over two hours, there's plenty of time for everything and Keeping the Faith tries mightily to please everyone. But it failed to satisfy me. I'm not sure who is at fault, but the movie wimps out.
Grade: C
©2000 Eugene Novikov
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