EThompsonUMD Director Anne Wheeler's "Suddenly Naked" is a romantic comedy/mid-life crisis story whose protagonist Jackie York (Wendy Crewson) is a successful and somewhat infamous novelist reminiscent - intentionally, the name suggests - of Jackie Collins but with greater literary cachet. We are introduced to the character as she approaches both her 40th birthday and an alcohol-induced breakdown. The latter has been triggered by writer's bloc and by the humiliation of having been publicly dumped by a much younger man, an aspiring movie director who also seduced her out of the filming rights to her previous novel. Jackie's comic redemption begins when she finally encounters a young novelist with whom she has been conducting a stimulating e-mail correspondence and mentorship. Having developed a remote crush for the writer, she has no idea that her fantasy soul mate is a mere 20 years old. This confusion serves as the basis for the film's very clever "meet cute" scene. Flustered, rain-bedraggled, and unwittingly observed by the young writer, Jackie enters a restaurant meeting spot and immediately assumes that a handsome, nattily dressed middle-aged gentleman is the person she had arranged to meet. After patiently listening to her long, acerbically witty monologue, the man finally admits to not having a clue who she is. When Jackie asks why in that case he let her rant on, his answer precisely captures the viewer's motive for following the film's first two acts: "I was fascinated to know what you were going to say next!"Unfortunately, after spending two thirds of its running time setting up and developing a wonderfully dynamic - if shrewish and neurotically self-absorbed - character, Elyse Friedman's screenplay devotes its last third to taming Jackie into a simpering, cliché -mouthing "kind" person. By the end of "Suddenly Naked," I felt rather like Greta Garbo must have when she cried "Give me back my Beast!" upon the appearance of the Prince in the last scene of "La Belle et la Bete." Only making matters worse, Friedman tries to disarm objections to the film's own schmaltzy ending by having the young writer's novel praised for "daring" to have a happy, tear-jerking ending in an era of cynical nihilism. Unfortunately this touch of postmodern self-consciousness has itself become too much of a cliché to rescue sappiness and dimwittedness from itself. Another problem with "Suddenly Naked" is that, for all the initial appeal of its female protagonist, the love affair with the young writer Patrick McKeating (Joe Cobden) only works on the "zipless" level and not in the reverse "Harold and Maude," life-affirming, love idealizing manner obviously intended. With his juggling tricks and anti- sophisticated manners, Patrick does have a goofy appeal, but it's more in the vein of Tom Hanks in "Big" than Tobey Maguire in "The Wonder Boys." It's no accident that his wittiest phrase ("my magic johnson") relates to his sexual rather than creative writing powers. Even though it was predictably impossible, I kept hoping that Jackie's pretended romance with her friend and fellow writer Lionel Heathcote (Peter Coyote) would turn into her character's redeeming relationship - but no such luck. Coyote (as usual) plays his minor role with wonderful presence and steals every scene he's in, but although it's never explicitly stated his character's gender orientation apparently precludes such an alternative (and probably equally schmaltzy) ending. The schmaltzy ending we do get is simply so extreme and prolonged that it utterly ruins an otherwise entertaining and sharply written romantic comedy with a very appealing heroine. The final scene, crosscutting between Jackie's keynote presentation at the P.E.N. Writers Conference and Patrick's ridiculously frustrated attempts to reach and enter the hotel where it is being held, really takes the cake. Having confessed the fraud of her work-in-progress in a TV interview, Jackie nonetheless writes enough of a new novel in the meantime to use it for her reading. Naturally, Patrick, disguised in a chef's uniform, arrives just in time to hear and embody its thematic punch line about true love's never being embarrassed. Too bad screenplays are not equally exempt.

Pam_Beale_McKenna Stumbling upon this film was quite a pleasant surprise for me. Seeing the name of Peter Coyote was enough to warrant my time. Little did I know I would be laughing out loud in response to this smart quickly paced dialogue. Slowly but surely the deep-seated vulnerabilities of these over-the-top personalities rise to the surface. I would love to gather a group of friends to view this little "gem" of a film. An endless round-robin of comments and spirited discussion would surely follow.

if-not-now-when I went into this film on a blind date, not knowing a thing about it -- at first, judging from the title, I thought my somewhat dim-witted date was trying to send me a not-too-subtle message. Anyway, I forgot all about my second-rate date once the movie got going -- the film was great! Often hilarious, and often touching, in just the right places. I was charmed, and want to check out more films by this director (but haven't had a chance yet). Oh yeah, the acting was good, too. Warmly recommended.

2headedboy Here's a case of a director getting her hands on some promising material and not delivering. I sat in the theatre thinking this story of a writer so anxious to protect her public image she end up almost ruining her personal life might be halfway decent if better choices had been made. But it seemed as if the director didn't really understand the story she was telling. The story's protagonist, Jackie is played by Wendy Crewson as a middle aged Jackie Collins-style writer who falls for a twenty year old from the creative writing class she teaches. Patrick (Joe Cobdon) seems to be as in to Jackie as she is to him and after some unconvincing flirting between the two of them they end up in bed in a sequence cut together like an eighties teen-film style montage.What puzzled me was that much of the dialogue and what happens suggested this was meant to be more along the lines of a Margaret Atwood-type character than Jackie Collins. Had Crewson played it more like an intellectual instead of a hammy romance novelist we might have better understood the stake's of going public with her affair. We also might bett er have understood Patrick's attraction to Jackie. After all we're meant to think this woman's writing got this confused kid through some awkward adolescent periods.It's probably not fair to ask Crewson to shoulder the blame. One assumes director Anne Wheeler would have reigned her in if she didn't agree with Crewson's characterization. But she didn't even have the sense to control her own hammy impulses. There were several pointless fast motion scenes, at least two excruciating Lilith Fair scored mope montages and it seemed whenever she wasn't sure how to block a scene she'd plop the characters in a bubblebath or a hottub.My main reason for attending this film was because I had read the screenwriter's funny and great novel, Then Again. This story doesn't appear to be at that level but it's well structured and there are some good lines and moments that might have been funny had the director had some sense of timing and the lead hadn't shouted all her lines.Joe Cobdon is sweet and likable as Patrick but Wheeler has him juggle at least three times. Because that's what young people do, right? Juggle.There are some okay scenes between Crewson and Peter Coyote and the film is generally better in the second half when it's a little more serious in tone. Both Wheller and Crewson seem more comfortable in that milieu. Perhaps they should stick to it in the future.