P.S. Your Cat is Dead
I really hope this is a Steve Guttenberg vanity project, something that he's doing just to get back into the swing of making movies after all these years. There's something to be said for just picking yourself up by your bootstraps and making a movie, dammit, and if nothing else, Mr. Guttenberg has done so with this film, which he wrote, produced, directed, and plays the lead.
But this film had better be a warm-up because it just can't stand on its own merits. It is a 90-minute affair in which neither plot nor character nor atmosphere nor philosophical insight are present. And like Guttenberg himself, the movie fancies itself cute - which it is not. It's just bad.
In a film where so much is so wrong, it's hard to know where to begin. Let's see: there's a gay latino thief strapped to Guttenberg's kitchen sink with the butt cut out of his pants; a cardboard prop of an ex-girlfriend who leaves him on the night the movie takes place (New Years Eve); Guttenberg's atrocious acting with broad, painted-on expressions better suited to mimework or Ringling Brothers than cinema close-ups; the supposedly "terrible" apartment he inhabits that looks more like a multimillion SOHO loft; the cheezy voiceover at the beginning; the cheezy pullback as the sun comes up the next morning with the rays hitting Guttenberg's face.
I could go on, but it would take longer than it does to actually see the film yourself. Suffice to say, you can safely skip this one. If you really want a good artist-in-midlife-crisis movie with gay undertones and wacky shenanigans, rent Tootsie instead. While I can respect Guttenberg's indie effort to jump-start his sinking acting career, that doesn't mean I have to like it - or that you should go see it.
*1/2 (out of four)
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