COMEDY; 1hr 54min
STARRING: Josh Lawson, Rachael Taylor
Manning up: Lawson
Ben (Lawson) is a 27-year-old Melbourne brand-positioning strategist with a gnat’s commitment span. (Actually, no. Gnats have more.) The Working Dog team of director Rob Sitch and his co-writers, Santo Cilauro and Tom Gleisner, set Ben up with slick proficiency but in any event, we’ve all seen his like before: a great guy if you can pin him down between parties.
So of course, Ben is due for an awakening, which begins at a high-school careers night when none of the kids have any questions for him after his less-than-inspiring speech. Squash! And worsened by the fact that Yemen-based human-rights lawyer Alex (Taylor, Lawson’s actual significant other and looking effortlessly stunning) shines in the same spotlight. Is it possible that the flash-rat life Ben’s friends envy may not be All That?
You got it. For congenitally incapable Ben to get it takes the rest of the movie as he basically behaves like an oaf. His tilt-a-whirl social world is aptly glibly done; less so his drawn-out existential angst. So grow up and get the girl, already!
