FLANNEL PAJAMAS

Director: Jeff Lipsky (1st major release)
Starring: Justin Kirk, Julianne Nicholson

Flannel Pajamas is a wise little movie, and a good one, although I imagine it will be relegated to the "soon forgotten" bin in short order. I think I can best describe it as "a fine little independent picture", but unfortunately there's nothing to distinguish it from the 50 other fine pictures released each year.

The movie, almost unfortunately set in New York, tells the story of a failed relationship, jumping from what it thinks is one key moment to the next along the arc of emotional rise and fall. It's a travelogue of a failed marital trip, if you will. One is a talky (supposedly) Jewish salesman of sorts, in the business of Broadway. The other a shy, freckled Catholic girl from Montana. We have the first date, where we find out the 2 people are emotional scarred and needy, but that they are good people nonetheless. We get some terrifically objective sex scenes, which soon enough fade from the screen (and we assume from their relationship). There's the sweet little marriage ceremony where positive vibes abound. Then there's slowly building (and perhaps even slightly creepy) distrust, confusion, and eventually repulsion. Kids are wanted, but never arrive. The man hates her friends and family. The girl hates his closest friend, his brother. And in short order, they split up, wondering what went wrong.

Well, as the mother of the girl tells us, it's no great secret why some marriages fail. Although given the number of failures, I tend to think it's more of a secret than we want to admit. This movie touches on how selfishness that is near the center of failure in a relationship, but the film's main argument is that it all comes down to the basics, and I think it's generally right. The boy is a saver, the girl a financial spender (of his bank account). He's also acidic and sarcastic, with a fair dose of passive-aggresiveness in his character. It's unspoken, at least until the mother shows a surprising streak of anti-semitism late in the film and speaks it (and much more), but the boy as written is a bit of the American Jewish stereotype.

But so is the girl, a stereotype that is, not Jewish. She is extremely needy, more than willing to take the money of her man. When things don't go her way she'll gladly complain and nag. They're imperfect individuals both, but not a shred more than the rest of us, I don't think. They're good people, but flawed. They're definitely not right for each other, but realize that they don't have much else in the world except each other. Some few of us are lucky enough to be dealt a great hand from the start, some others have nothing from the get-go and are destined to lose, but most people's cards are somewhere in between. That's where these people live. They hoped their hand was better than it was. And then they lost their bet.

Standouts: A solid enough script, with solid enough acting, in a solid enough movie.
Blowouts: It was 'good' throughout, but at no point did was it better than that.

Grade: B-