BOYS AND GIRLS (Dimension) Starring: Freddie Prinze Jr., Claire Forlani, Amanda Detmer, Jason Biggs, Heather Donahue. Screenplay: The Drews Producers: Jay Cohen, Lee Gottsegen and Murray Schisgal. Director: Robert Iscove. MPAA Rating: PG-13 (sexual content, profanity, adult themes) Running Time: 91 minutes. Reviewed by Scott Renshaw.
Having ventured into the fairy tale realms of relationship dynamics in 1999's Cinderella story SHE'S ALL THAT, director Robert Iscove and Freddie Prinze Jr. clearly felt there was a more contemporary spin on male-female interaction that they could rip to shreds for a youth audience. So in BOYS AND GIRLS they decided to tell a story of Ryan Walker (Prinze) and Jennifer Burrows (Claire Forlani), two individuals whose paths cross repeatedly over the course of several years before they end up becoming friends. One of them takes a casual view of sex and a cynical perspective on the prospects for love to succeed; the other is a compulsive planner and hopeless romantic. Each one has a best pal of the same sex in whom to confide -- Ryan's compulsive liar roommate Hunter (Jason Biggs) and Jennifer's high-strung roommate Amy (Amanda Detmer), respectively -- but ultimately they communicate better with each other than with anyone else. Then they have sex, and everything gets terribly complicated despite the fact that they tell each other they both believe it was a mistake.
Paging Nora Ephron: I hope you've got your attorney ready, because this is one slam-dunk of a plagiarism case. Yes, BOYS AND GIRLS is practically a point-by-point remake of WHEN HARRY MET SALLY, dumbed down significantly to appeal to viewers even younger than the lead actors' peer group. Sure, there are a few minor variations -- in this incarnation, it's Ryan who's the Type A Sally Albright, and Jennifer who's the Type B Harry Burns -- but the devil is in the details. Jennifer tells Ryan that she's got a date, then suggests that Ryan should "get out there" as well. Jennifer makes a point during a conversation with Ryan by making a scene in a diner. The "morning after" scene finds one of the participants trying to make an uncomfortably quick getaway. There's a montage in which Jennifer leaves multiple answering machine messages for the emotionally wounded Ryan. The protagonists' respective best pals get together the first time they meet. And so on, and so on.
Granted, Hollywood has always been in the recycling business, and there are far worse romantic comedies to use as a model than WHEN HARRY MET SALLY. But BOYS AND GIRLS does what most bad copies of good films do: It mimics a structure without having the faintest grasp of the insight or charm that fueled the original. The script, credited to "The Drews" (actors Andrew Lowery and Andrew Miller, whose only previous screen credit as writers came for the Dennis Rodman action vehicle SIMON SEZ), doubles the pain of lame situations by adding horribly forced banter, the kind of stuff that just makes you feel sorry for the people reading it. BOYS AND GIRLS does have a great supporting cast in Biggs, Detmer and erstwhile BLAIR WITCH victim Heather Donahue (virtually unrecognizable as a blonde); their energy makes the film almost watchable, since one or more of them is on screen much of the time. Unfortunately, the force of their personalities just makes the hole at the center of the film all the more evident.
It would be easy enough for that interpretation to be read as a cheap bit of Freddie Prinze Jr.-bashing, which it actually is not. Granted, it's a ghastly sight watching Prinze pretend to be a geeky, braces-wearing 16-year-old, but he's relaxed and pleasant enough for most of the film. Claire Forlani also does a perfectly serviceable job considering how little context is provided for her personality. The problem with BOYS AND GIRLS is that in the process of re-making WHEN HARRY MET SALLY with attractive twenty-somethings, Iscove and company have lost the wisdom and wit that comes from a story about the romantic travails of thirty- and forty-somethings. All that remains is a familiar shell that has been filled with silly nightclub choreography and a complete lack of chemistry between the two leads. It's a shallow little film that's just not funny enough or perceptive enough to register as anything but weak imitation. The opening credits re-make of J. Geils Band's "Love Stinks" is merely a clever diversion; apparently Harry Connick Jr. was unavailable to do the honors.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 when Claire-y met Freddies: 4.
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