[Review] Almost Love is Entertaining While Completely Oblivious

The opening scene of writer/director Mike Doyle’s Almost Love establishes four of our lovelorn characters meeting for a double date. One on side there’s Adam (Scott Evans) and Marklin (“Midnight Kiss”’s Augustus Prew), who’ve been together for five years and are in a rut. More on that in a second. The other is their close friend Cammy (Michelle Buteau) and her new beau Henry (Colin Donnell). While Henry is using the restroom, Cammy is freaking out because he told her they should talk and when your new boo says, “I need to talk to you about something,” it’s never good. 

He probably has gonorrhea, she reasons while Marklin and Adam tell a story about an accident involving a dog, its diarrhea, their housekeeper and a Roomba. Henry comes back, looking a mix of panic and fear and keeps commenting about how Adam and Marklin have a lot of property. “So much property” he repeats. 

It turns out that Henry does not have gonorrhea. It’s much worse. He’s homeless. 

You see it’s a problem because these chatty and catty friends are the epitome of stereotypical rich New Yorkers. Sure, some say they are living paycheck to paycheck but we never really see them struggle. “I picked another loser,” Cammy laments while her zany schoolteacher friend Haley (Zoe Chao) looks at her like she’s some kind of hero: “Oh you slept with a homeless. You’re so kind. Gave to someone in need.”

Oof.

Haley is also dealing with her own set of problems, namely that she’s been hired to “tutor” seventeen year old Scott James (Harpoon’s Christopher Gray), which means she’s paid thousands of dollars to meet with him four times a week to practically rewrite everything he does to get him in college. Oh, and she’s kind of in lust with Scott James and he’s totally in love with her the way a seventeen year old boy would be. Rounding out the group is Adam’s bestie Elizabeth (Kate Walsh) and her mostly absent husband of fifteen years Damon (Chaz Lamar Shepherd). 

To recap, a five year relationship, a fifteen year relationship, a new beginning and a schoolyard (and completely inappropriate) flirt. The most time is spent with Adam, the painter, and Marklin the pseudo Instagram influencer who is constantly stopped by a fan on the streets of NYC to get a selfie or show off the shoes or coat they bought because of him. While Marklin’s star is on the rise, Adam’s talent is going wasted because he ghostpaints for a famous “painter” named Ravella Brewer (a scene-stealing-and-chewing Patricia Clarkson). She pays him a pittance and then mass sells his work as her own for $100,000.

Adam and Marklin attend couples counseling as they struggle to figure out what’s next for the two of them. Meanwhile, Adam is late on his portion of the rent and is upset about it while Marklin doesn’t care. 

There’s a lot going on in this svelte 94 minute romantic dramedy and not all of it works. The biggest problem is that these characters are so oblivious about their own privilege. What’s worse, first time feature writer/director Doyle also seems oblivious. There’s a moment where I thought maybe we’d see a glimmer of class examination as Adam despondently asks, “where is home?” 

Home and dependency are topics the movie casually examines, but never brings home. From Adam wondering where his home is while simultaneously being dependent on Marklin to Haley telling Cammy that Scott James “needs me. Like he really needs me” and Cammy schooling her on co-dependency while simultaneously being co-dependent with the homeless man she’s still dating. It’s all so oblivious. And some of the humor stems from that, but I don’t necessarily think its purposeful because none of the characters come to any epiphany. 

That said, Almost Love succeeds in the romance and likability category as its success falls squarely on the adorable cast who feel like real friends and have some fantastic scenes together. In particular, Haley’s conversations with Scott James have an air of quirkiness that’s endearing. And the on-again-off-again romantic interludes between Adam and Marklin feel realistic, if simplistic. 

The entire cast is stacked and their chemistry is palpable. There’s just too much going on that none of the interesting relationships outside of our gay main characters receive much time to examine their situations. Almost Love doesn’t know if it wants to be an introspective drama about thirty-somethings trying to figure their lives out or a zany comedy. On one hand, we have a movie with characters realizing that “this is when it’s supposed to get easier” and lamenting the fact that things in romance are difficult. They say this while, of course, Henry is legitimately homeless. 

The other side is a more zanier movie. One where despondent Scott James, after being rejected by Haley, apes a literary figure Haley has presumably taught him about and sticks his head in her oven. “Oh, it doesn’t work like that,” she tells him with a pat on the shoulder. “It’s electric.”  

I kinda want to see more of that second movie.