With its rom-com quirk and indie-rock sincerity, "Going the Distance" starts off at risk of being a little too cute to tolerate.
The tale of a blossoming boy-meets-girl interrupted by girl-moves-cross-country seems to see this danger coming, and tries to head it off by playing with the genre's clichés. In one funny scene, our heroes' first bong-fueled kiss is accompanied by the "Top Gun" ballad "Take My Breath Away" - which we soon realize is not playing on the movie's soundtrack but is the work of a roommate who can hear the action and wanted "to DJ your hook-up."
But there's a bigger danger than cuteness here, and it's a problem the filmmakers create for themselves. They take two actors whose appeal can be measured in cheek-pinchability (Drew Barrymore) and hair-tousle-worthiness (Justin Long) and emphasize not their adorable natures but their erotic needs. With its bedroom shots and purposefully explicit dialogue, the movie is sometimes like being forced to watch your kid sister having sex.
In one scene, the lovers reunite at Barrymore's sister's house after weeks apart. They're so impatient they start making out on the dining table, only to be caught in flagrante by family members. The scene itself is a good gag, and co-star Jim Gaffigan milks it expertly for laughs, but the delivery is terribly off-key.
The filmmakers regularly walk this line between the funny and the cringeworthy, most often when Long is hanging with two sleazy pals played by Jason Sudeikis and Charlie Day. Jokes about Hitler, bowel movements and maternal anatomy often fall on the wrong side of the line.
"Distance" seems genuinely interested in exploring the problem of long-distance relationships, and it ups the uncertainty ante by placing Barrymore and Long in fields (journalism and the music business, respectively) that generate enough angst these days to further complicate major life decisions. But the plotting is too schematic, moving us through the steps of the affair's disintegration without making us believe them.
Much has been made of Barrymore and Long's offscreen status as on again/off again lovers. That probably makes a nice marketing angle, but it does little for the film. Here, they come across as best buds, whose ease around each other probably bodes well for real-life coupledom but lacks the friction that sparks compelling on-screen romances.
Presumably, their relationship in real life has involved sex. But I don't want to know about it, and I certainly don't want to see at the movies.
"Going the Distance"
Our grade: C-
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Running Time: 102 min
MPAA rating: R
Release Date: Sept. 3, 2010
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