Something More Reviews

Neither better nor worse than the majority of Generation-X date pictures, this romantic comedy is blessed with some bright faces but cursed with a clumsy tendency to bury its few original touches under a heap of cliches. Sensitive sad-sack Sam (Michael Goorjian) performs better on the basketball court than in the dating arena and his buddies, whose social lives revolve around their amateur basketball team, all suffer from some form of cherchez la femme syndrome. Sam's pal Harry (Thomas Cavanagh) marries a woman who sleeps with his best man. Womanizing friend Jim (David Lovgren), plays the field but can't make a commitment and goes out of his way to romance women Sam likes. Dan (Peter Flemming) must overcome alcoholism to rejoin the boy-meets-girl game. Declaring that love should supersede lust, the optimistic Sam woos independent-minded Kelly (Chandra West), even though Jim has scored with her. Screenwriter Peter Bryant recycles characters who were cliched when Shakespeare was a stripling — the hound dogs, players, hoochie mamas and losers might as well wear numbers signify the stereotypes they represent — but the cast rises above the sludge. West and the offbeat Cavanagh (star of TV's Ed) are especially charming, but unless you regularly shoot hoops, enjoy getting smashed and haven't yet seen the dark side of age thirty, this exercise in 'Men are from Mars/Women are from Venus' bellyaching is something less than gripping.