Cast: French Stewart, Bridgette Wilson, Bill Bellamy, Tyra Banks, Jason Bateman, Tiffani-Amber Thiessen
Director: Jeff Franklin
Producers: Craig Baumgarten, Jeff Franklin
Screenplay: Jeff Franklin
Cinematography: Uta Briesewitz
Music: Bennett Salvay
U.S. Distributor: Independent Artists
Beware of movies with the word "stinks" in the title. More often than not, the adjective can be applied with reasonable accuracy to the film's overall quality. (Remember Life Stinks?) Love Stinks is the feature debut of Jeff Franklin, and, given the number of hats he wore for this production (director, writer, producer), he has no one to blame but himself for the dismal results. The picture plays like a diluted version of Danny DeVito's blistering black comedy, War of the Roses, crossed with the abysmal Ellen DeGeneres vehicle, Mr. Wrong. Unfortunately, in tone and temperament, it's significantly closer to the latter than the former.
Love Stinks' protagonist is Seth Winnick (French Stewart), a successful TV sit com writer. Seth is intended to be a likable guy, but French's portrayal is often so grating that it's easy to forget we're supposed to be rooting for this loser. At the wedding of his best friend, Larry (Bill Bellamy), Seth encounters the girl of his dreams, blond bombshell Chelsea Turner (Bridgette Wilson). The chemistry is there, so they both dump their dates, then head off for a game of miniature golf, a fast-food lunch, and a night of unbridled sex. Soon, Chelsea has moved in with Seth and is hinting strongly that she wants to get married. When Seth won't pop the question, Chelsea turns into the proverbial bitch from hell, doing everything in her power to make life miserable for her lover, including slapping him with a palimony suit and taking out a restraining order against him. But Seth doesn't intend to stand by and let his life be ruined by one manipulative, vindictive woman.
The most distressing aspect of Love Stinks is the amateurish and sophomoric level of comedy apparent throughout the production. This is the kind of material that nightly sit-com viewers get a steady diet of, and the sounds of amusement in the theater sounded surprisingly like a laugh track, with audience members chortling in all the expected places regardless of whether a gag was actually funny. I suppose some people are entertained when an old lady makes a salacious comment (as if age had anything to do with knowledge about sex) or when someone has repeated flatulence problems, but I've seen these things a few too many times for them to have much impact. Even when Franklin finds something funny (which he admittedly does from time-to-time; Love Stinks is not devoid of genuine mirth), he overuses it until it's no longer even vaguely humorous.
The cast for Love Stinks is clearly not on Hollywood's A-list. French Stewart (the guy's real name, apparently) comes from a TV background, and, to this point, has only had a few minor parts in lesser movies. His performance as Seth is unlikely to convince anyone that he's leading man material. Likewise, Bridgette Wilson (The Real Blonde) was not hired for her acting ability, although, unlike Stewart, it's pretty easy to guess exactly why she got the part. Four simple words kept popping to mind every time she was on screen: "Those can't be real." Natural or not, they are accorded plenty of exposure. Rounding out the cast are Bill Bellamy as Seth's best friend, Tyra Banks as Chelsea's confidante, and Jason Bateman and Tiffani-Amber Thiessen as shallow TV stars.
Love Stinks is being billed as an "un-romantic comedy." And, while it's accurate to say that it's not romantic, it's not all that funny, either. Franklin wants to take the audience into the realm of black comedy, but he never has the guts to go for the jugular. The viciousness is tame - a cat thrown off a bridge, hair remover put in the conditioner bottle, and so on. Even towards the end, when a gun is fired, the target is not a vital organ. (Although, considering the lack of intelligence exhibited by these characters, the brain would qualify as fitting that description.) Lame, sit-com influenced efforts like Love Stinks make one marvel at the task accomplished by Danny DeVito in War of the Roses, a film where the director successfully traversed the delicate line between keeping the audience laughing and making them uncomfortable. Here, Franklin takes the easy route - there's little chance that Love Stinks is going to cause many viewers to react either way.
© 1999 James Berardinelli