Beauty and the beast. Oscar and Amy (Perry and Campbell) try to avoid romantic entanglements. As if...
Oscar (Perry) is a Chicago architect working with his partner Peter (Platt) to get a seriously important job building an arts centre for young tycoon Charles Newman (McDermott). The jealous Charles erroneously thinks Oscar is gay, so he asks him to keep an eye on his lovely mistress Amy (Campbell). Of course, Amy and Oscar are soul mates (sigh!), but Oscar can't tell her he's really straight, because that would jeopardise his and Peter's career. Hilarity ensues.
While there's something vaguely wrong with the whole premise, the plot's real problems centre on a string of outlandish coincidences that throw Oscar and Amy together again and again, with increasingly improbable results. This is so irritating that it's hard to relax and just enjoy the film for what it is: an empty-headed romcom. Fortunately, Perry and Campbell are effortlessly entertaining, and the supporting cast is colourful and funny. McDermott does his best with his unnecessarily villainous role (wouldn't the whole thing be more interesting if he was a nice guy?). And newcomer Santostefano at least keeps things moving, using the Chicago setting nicely. Although he completely misses the chance to have fun with the film's title.
[12--themes, language] 5.Jun.00
US release 22.Oct.99; UK release 30.Jun.00
