Textuality (2011)

Purely Joyful Movie!

It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

I wanted to but couldn't!

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

In this movie, everyone has a Blackberry. Apparently the current generation of smartphones had not been invented. And everyone is always texting.Breslin is a financial adviser, but he's not doing too well right now and if he loses one more client, his boss Kara will fire him. One reason for his current problems is that six months ago he and Erin were supposed to get married, but something happened. We saw their romance in the opening credits, but with no audio other than an enjoyable song by Ray Charles. dates several other women, including waitress Heather and art teacher Dina (who is demanding a commitment)--and his boss.Simone has a blog "Simone Says", and she is an artist (Dina is her art teacher) who refuses to sell her paintings, though she's quite good. It's never clear how she makes money. She is dating four men. Clive has money and is obsessed with her. Marcus is in the NBA. Colin is a loser in a band. And Jacob has to call his mother to pick him up, and he's a germophobe. Actually, as I look at the photos of the last two, I'm not absolutely sure I've got their names right. Of the four, Marcus has the best personality. However ...Mike has inherited a lot of money and appears to be Breslin's best friend, though at one point it appears Breslin has to please Mike so Mike won't drop him, which would cause Kara to fire him. Mike is the standout character in this movie, so it is fortunate that we see him and Breslin together at the grocery store, Mike's job delivering newspapers (and not very well), and in a senior bowling league. No, Mike's not a senior, and the others on his team are mostly stereotypes--oxygen tank, walker, and so on. One man seems fine and gives advice.There's only one reason we would be following these separate story lines. Yes, Breslin and Simone have a "meet cute" moment and she hates him at first. Simone hates texting so Breslin agrees to speak on the phone instead. But they are both quite attracted to each other and it is clear that for both of them the relationship will be more meaningful than the other relationships they are having. By the way, Dina doesn't know about Simone and Breslin.Eventually, Breslin and Simone have problems, so the question is will they once again discover how much they mean to each other. And what about the other relationships each one is having?This is a cute movie, if somewhat edgy. The sound went out a lot, which seems unnecessary. It was sometimes hard to follow what was being said. That's how bad it was. Do we really need that much bad language to tell a story?I never watched an episode of "Will and Grace", so I'm not sure why I felt Eric McCormack should have been more appealing. I don't even know the man. But here he's supposed to be a jerk, and he does that well.Liam Card, as I've mentioned, gives the standout performance, and Carly Pope is quite good as Simone, though I'm not that crazy about her. And Kristen Hager, as Dani, does a great job in the scene where she is showing her own art.And about the art. Of course, I'm not a person who would truly appreciate art that doesn't look like what it represents. But I would say the artists whose work is shown in this movie are talented.On the subject of Ray Charles, why is one of his biggest hits performed here by someone else, with RAP? And why were we given the impression the music was going to be good? One good song at the beginning, and maybe a few others, and four scenes with nice instrumental music. But for me, the music wasn't that good overall.A curious choice made early in the movie: isn't art class supposed to be colorful? I'm sure there is some artistic reason for this, but everything looks brown. It's like that TV series a few years back where the detective and his family were in a car accident. If his son survived, everything was blue. Then he would wake up and it was his wife who survived, and everything with yellow and orange. There's a name for this.Overall, I think this is more than just the ordinary romantic comedy.

My last review was deleted - because another user reported it as abuse. Really?! A negative review is abuse? Please don't try to sensor the negative comments about the movie. I'm entitled to my opinion. Just as the people who decided this movie was worth making are entitled to make it. I'm resubmitting some of my review. (I've left out some parts that were negative about the writer - he wrote me a personal email about my review.) I can only assume my comments hurt someone's feelings and so they had my review deleted. Let's hope I'm allowed to keep it here. What kind of website is this if I can't write a negative review without someone having it removed from the site? Be authentic. It is what it is and I have every right to hate this film. Someone made this film, I made the mistake of watching it and so have have ever right to review it and speak my opinion. Here goes:I'm a positive person who believes that if you can't say anything nice don't say anything at all but this movie was so horrible that I had to express it to let these feelings leave my being. I registered for this site just to leave this review. On top of trying to save you from throwing away an hour and a half of your life, I frankly want to vent that such a poorly written movie was even produced. I am not a writer so I don't even have the words or skills to convey just how awful the script was. But I'm going to try! The story is immature and uninteresting. I kept thinking to myself it is as if this was written by a 12 year old boy! It was cheesy and lacking in knowledge of people, relationships and life. It had no depth, humour, compassion, heart or soul. The writing was beyond terrible. It was as if you were watching a spoof of a bad movie. The character of best friend of the lead in the film was so immature and annoying to watch that I had a hard time believing that anyone would write this character in a movie. I thought, it's as if this annoying, immature and unintelligent character wrote this movie! Then when I see this site I notice that the actor playing that character did write the movie! I'm beyond words. There are meaningful and excellent stories to be told but this is not one of them. Oh, and if you are reading this thinking now you really have to see it to see how bad it is - no you don't! Please. It's painful. Spare yourself. Oh gosh, how was that for judgement. Oh well! That's my review.

Just saw this on TMN! Have to say this RomCom is finally different than all the other drivel coming out of Hollywood. Nice to see that in the end they don't get married automatically. Why does Hollywood assume all their audiences are stupid and will buy into two people automatically falling into a marriage? Really nice to see a change. Amazing how true to life this is!!! The three guys are HILARIOUS and Jason's best friend is really funny! I love how the dialogue isn't trying to be something it's not, feels like watching some friends. The lead girl is SO quirky and reminds me of Zooey Deschanel. Definitely see this if you want something different!!!

If you watch this film you will believe that Jason Lewis definitely hit his peak as Smith Jarrod in "Sex and The City." His high, nasal voice constantly distracted me from trying to find him attractive. Even though 30% of his shots were of him naked to the waist (I am female), it was not enough to overcome his lack of acting ability or chemistry with anyone in the movie. I suppose the "message" of the film was a comment upon how superficial and incapable of intimacy we have become. By creating characters that had absolutely no chemistry with each other and just went through the motions of sex, the makers of this film succeeded. I have seen Eric McCormack and Jason Lewis do great work, so I can only blame it on the director, Warren Sonoda and the writer, Liam Card. Even though the film made an episode of "Gossip Girl" seem deep and meaningful, the final 20 minutes were the most painful to get through. There was simply no substance. My advise is that even if it is free to view, save your time for anything else.