THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, March 12, 1996 TAG: 9603120034
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E7 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Movie Review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, MOVIE CRITIC
LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines
IF LUCY FELL, perhaps we could leave the theater and escape from this persistent whining about nothing.
It's a mischievous, naughty thought that occurs to the viewer less than half way through ``If Lucy Fell,'' an innocuous romantic comedy that is heavy on talk and almost totally lacking in insight.
The basic premise is abundant in comic possibilities. Lucy, a therapist, and Joe, a painter and art teacher, are platonic roommates in New York City who are both dissatisfied with their love lives. She dates weirdos. He has spent the past five years spying on his drop-dead-gorgeous neighbor (model Elle Macpherson) and has never gotten up the courage to speak to her.
Lucy and Joe vow that they'll jump off the Brooklyn Bridge if they don't find true love by age 30. That, at the least, would spare them the endless whinings of the ``thirtysomething'' set we've seen on TV.
Erich Schaeffer, who wrote, directed and stars as Joe, clearly is a Woody Allen wannabe, but there's scarcely a splinter of wit evident. Poor Joe, the character he plays, is such a nerd that he dresses up like Elmer Fudd (in a flap-eared cap) and, miraculously, gets to kiss Elle Macpherson.
The title character is played by ever-pert Sarah Jessica Parker, an actress who has excellent comic timing as well as a flair for the absurd. (She was delightful in her recent off-Broadway play, in which she played a puppy dog). The trouble is that she has no material with which to work here. Perhaps, the only current place for her type of comedienne is on a TV series, an undesirable place for an actress who has reached top billing in movies.
Ben Stiller, the son of Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, wears dreadlocks that could have been borrowed from Whoopi Goldberg. He plays the spaced-out artist who is Parker's date.
As a team, Parker and Schaeffer lack any semblance of chemistry. The basic trouble is that there is never any tension between them, or for their situation. They are never desperate enough, or remotely intelligent enough, to possibly jump off the Brooklyn Bridge. Indeed, their search for ``true love'' seems quite superficial and happenstance.
As a writer, Schaeffer lacks the absurdist quality that allows a genius like Woody Allen to get away with creating marvelous comedies out of specious plots. Take away the absurdity and you have, with ``If Lucy Fell,'' merely a tame, nothing existence looking for somewhere to go.
The ending is so predictable that you just sit around and wait for it to happen. ILLUSTRATION: MOVIE REVIEW
``If Lucy Fell''
Cast: Sarah Jessica Parker, Erich Schaeffer, Ben Stiller, Elle
Macpherson
Director and Writer: Erich Schaeffer
Music: songs performed by Marry Me Jane
MPAA rating: R (sexual innuendo)
Mal's rating: one and 1/2 stars
Locations: Circle 4 and Main Gate in Norfolk; Columbus and
Lynnhaven 8 in Virginia Beach; Cinemark and Greenbrier 13 in
Chesapeake
by CNB