Celebrating his twenty-eighth birthday, Denis wonders about his circle of eccentric friends, until a friend’s death makes them all take stock of their lives.
Genre: Feature Film-Comedy
Rating: R
Release Date: 6-MAR-2001
Media Type: DVDAfter viewing the gay ensemble film The Broken Hearts Club–the subtitle of which helpfully points out that it’s “a romantic comedy”–you might feel as if you’ve been offered a discussion conundrum not unlike the kind that Mike Myers’s Linda “Coffee Talk” Richman would put forward: “The Broken Hearts Club is neither romantic nor comedic. Discuss.” What it is, rather, is a gay male version of Steel Magnolias, right down to the funeral scene and hospital visit. While decidedly less melodramatic than that Southern chick flick, it still aspires to a kind of big-group love-in feeling that’s only vaguely comic. And romance? Well, there’s some somewhere, when the characters aren’t carping about how the only thing they’re good at is being gay. They all wrestle with their Big Issues–should Patrick (Ben Weber) donate sperm so his sister can have a baby with her lesbian lover? Will cynical Dennis (Timothy Olyphant) finally admit he loves just-out-of-the-closet Kevin (Andrew Keegan)? How will love-’em-and-leave-’em Cole (Dean Cain) feel when he’s rejected by the closeted movie star?–but to little effect, despite some snappy one-liners and occasional keen observances of gay culture. Writer-director Greg Berlanti’s screenplay still feels about two or three drafts away from completion, and when faced with stalling action, he opts for a montage set to one of many Carpenters’ songs (covers, not the actual hits themselves). Kudos go to the acidic Weber for infusing what could have been a whiny character with a dry, intelligent wit, and the surprisingly charming Cain, who makes Cole someone you can’t really hate too much despite all his faults–it would be like hating a puppy. If only all the characters were half as appealing. –Mark Englehart
Buy “The Broken Hearts Club” For Only $12.51
March 5, 2008
#1
Having seen it from start to finish, the first thing that came to my mind was “A total lack of originality”. What’s more, the strory lines are not convincing and some are just plain stupid, irrelevant and redundant, such as the death of the restaurant owner (played by what’s his name), for example. Dean Caine gives a poor performance as a gay man (or as a character actor in general). All in all, it’s just a poor immitation of the much talked-about and brilliantly produced TV series “Queer As Folks”
March 5, 2008
#2
OK, so I haven’t watched the DVD. However, I DID see the movie, and it was passable at best. These characters are superficial and half of the subplots could be scrubbed without dispensing of anything substantive. Other than that the characters are gay, there is no reason to watch this movie. Well, that’s not ENTIRELY true — there is Dean Cain, and he actually can act.
March 5, 2008
#3
I had high expectations for this movie. I was expecting a “romantic comedy” like it says on the title. It is neither romantic nor comedic. It is a movie about a bunch of bitter gay men who find thier only happiness in thier friendships with each other, and I would like to add that if my friendships were as dull and depressing as these friendships I would just die. Word of advice, if you are gay and coming out of the closet, don’t watch this movie(good advice for anyone actually), you will want to stay in the closet because this movie portrays a depressing lifestyle after coming out. The lesbian says it just right when she tells her brother that he is alot more miserable now then when he was in the closet. This movie seems to pick out everything I would hate about the gay and lesbian lifestyles. I don’t find myself caring about any of the characters, except for maybe the character of the lesbian who has the gay brother and mabye the “newbie”. The only reason I give this two stars is that this movie does support the idea that being gay is not about having sex with every guy in sight as much as the straight world seems to portray the gay world as, well, with the exception of the guy who goes to Phoenix for a month getting a movie role. Look at this, I just watched this movie and I can’t even remember the character names it was that pathetic. To top it off, the movie is so boring, there is nothing in the movie that keeps you interested in watching it, the only reason I watched it all is because I kept hoping it would pick up and get better as it went along. I do have to say that this movie is original, and original is usually good, but in this case, being original is a bad thing becuase I haven’t seen anything so originally pathetic! This tops my list for dumbest gay-themed movie ever made. Don’t waste your time with it!
March 5, 2008
#4
How very disappointing. I had really looked forward to seeing this film, but unfortunately, I should have passed. The script is FULL of cliches (Judy Garland references, over-the-top queens, etc.) and some of the most trite and forced dialogue I’ve heard in quite some time. Although I realize that most cliches BECOME cliches because they’re true, it was very disheartening to watch this film and see the same tired old stereotypes play out before me. Dean Cain isn’t bad in his role, but the rest of the cast is sub-par. Timothy Olyphant, who showed so much promise in “GO,” is without question the weakest actor onscreen. I’m surprised the writer hasn’t found a home at Showtime’s “Queer As Folk” — the writing is just about as amateurish as that wretched show. I’d give anything to see a film or TV series with REAL, honest, and fully realized gay characters. Sadly, this isn’t it.
March 6, 2008
#5
Any movie that uses The Carpenters’ songs extensively throughout the soundtrack is going to annoy a certain segment of the population. It’s not just the songs, it’s the idea that The Carpenters (*qua* cultural phenomenon), admittedly second- or even third-string, represent a haven for our own comfortable mediocrity. I don’t know, but movies about mediocrity, whether in art or in love, leave me with the feeling that I’ve just eaten a cinematic Pop Tart. This movie, that not-so-secretly wants to be a queer Sex In the City, is the hopefully heartwarming story of a gaggle of gay (male) friends, all searching for Mr. Right. These boys are all, ostensibly, second-string. But of course, even the second string is uniformly cute and buff. There is no obesity in this movie’s world, no buck-teeth, no bad skin. And Frasier’s Dad in drag is as funny as this movie gets. They laugh, they cry, they kiss, and they cuddle. The meaning of life is coded by hapless drug overdose (but don’t stress out too much: he’s too cute to die). In short, it’s light; it’s fluffy, it’s predictable; it’s a Lie.
So why two stars instead of, say, none? Well, Pop Tarts have their place. I mean, no one really likes them, but there they are: we eat them by default. The cast in this movie is the gooey filling. Timothy Olyphant, Dean Cain, Andrew Keegan, and Ben Weber are all talented actors and fun too watch even here. All three lead a cast that gives the trite screenplay of this movie more lustre than it deserves. Plus, there’s the eye candy that’s supposed to make us feel (I guess) that nothing really too intense is going to happen to us, and if it does (a la Karen Carpenter) somebody whose life is even more boring than our own, might be playing our records, misty-eyed, decades hence.