Ira & Abby
0
Posted
September 28, 2007 in
Film
Kissing Jessica Stein, writer-actress Jennifer Westfeldt’s debut film, set her reputation as a comedienne who served up classic romcom fare with a cheeky twist. Her tentative lesbian love match drew more from Woody Allen than SCUM. Her follow-up lovers Abby and Ira (Westfeldt and Chris Messina) are straight but no less twisted; within six hours of their unlikely introduction at a gym (neither has a penchant for anything more strenuous than lifting a wine glass), the couple is engaged. Why? Well, why not experiment when half of all well-intentioned weddings already end in divorce. As Ira’s a nebbish basket case and Abby glows with a selfless radiance that borders on mania, their ying and yang personalities convince them that they form a perfectly logical whole. Annie Hall flashbacks are impossible to avoid–especially in the too-quirky set up–as Westfeldt is interested in mining similar truths. In both, opposites attract only to beat each other into submission. Only marriage, not vulnerability, is the anchor that weighs her couple down and in short order they find themselves annulled and more dizzied by love than during their whirlwind courtship–that is, if there’s anything more to married love than tender pragmatism. Ira & Abby’s increasingly clear-headed and practical slant on romance blossoms into an odd love poem for cynics who have thrown sentimentality into the garbage. Robert Cary’s chipper direction has ill-prepared us for the shift in tone. You half expect Owen Wilson to show up with a bong. But when Ira’s ice-cold mom and dad (Judith Light and Robert Klein) and Abby’s huggy bohemian parents (Fred Willard and Frances Conroy) get thrown into the mix, Westfeldt allows a few rays of stubborn optimism to poke through as after decades of tense domesticity, Klein offers his son his sole piece of wisdom: "You’ll never really know someone–the best you can do is stack the deck." (Amy Nicholson)
Kissing Jessica Stein, writer-actress Jennifer Westfeldt’s debut film, set her reputation as a comedienne who served up classic romcom fare with a cheeky twist. Her tentative lesbian love match drew more from Woody Allen than SCUM. Her follow-up lovers Abby and Ira (Westfeldt and Chris Messina) are straight but no less twisted; within six hours of their unlikely introduction at a gym (neither has a penchant for anything more strenuous than lifting a wine glass), the couple is engaged. Why? Well, why not experiment when half of all well-intentioned weddings already end in divorce. As Ira’s a nebbish basket case and Abby glows with a selfless radiance that borders on mania, their ying and yang personalities convince them that they form a perfectly logical whole. Annie Hall flashbacks are impossible to avoid–especially in the too-quirky set up–as Westfeldt is interested in mining similar truths. In both, opposites attract only to beat each other into submission. Only marriage, not vulnerability, is the anchor that weighs her couple down and in short order they find themselves annulled and more dizzied by love than during their whirlwind courtship–that is, if there’s anything more to married love than tender pragmatism. Ira & Abby’s increasingly clear-headed and practical slant on romance blossoms into an odd love poem for cynics who have thrown sentimentality into the garbage. Robert Cary’s chipper direction has ill-prepared us for the shift in tone. You half expect Owen Wilson to show up with a bong. But when Ira’s ice-cold mom and dad (Judith Light and Robert Klein) and Abby’s huggy bohemian parents (Fred Willard and Frances Conroy) get thrown into the mix, Westfeldt allows a few rays of stubborn optimism to poke through as after decades of tense domesticity, Klein offers his son his sole piece of wisdom: "You’ll never really know someone–the best you can do is stack the deck." (Amy Nicholson)
