Plan B

Plan B (Director: Marco Berger): If ever there were an award given for most inappropriate lingering shots of snugly covered genitalia, it would surely go to Plan B, a movie that boasts multiple exchanges with little more than stationary close-ups of crotches. The justification is likely something to the effect of exaggerated sexual tension, or gender role irony in response to female objectivity in film, where women are never filmed in close-up without some visible boobage, but realistically it seems a lot more like, “hey, I can see a dick outline and it’s turning me on!”

Perhaps this shouldn’t be surprising in a film that is essentially a perverse fantasy, with Bruno (Manuel Vignau) responding to his ex-girlfriend’s lack of romantic interest by developing an ersatz homosexual relationship with her new boyfriend Pablo (Lucas Ferraro). It’s the sort of thing that broad high-concept heteronormative comedy is based on, and, if it were an American film, it would likely feature Will Ferrell and Paul Rudd.

But this isn’t a comedy, and it isn’t interested in catering to traditional male anxieties, playing out through a series of awkward boyish conversations and latent sexual tension. The goal is to create an organic union between unlikely lovers, with a pointed weed-induced conversation about Neverland to let us know that the director has read some queer theory. They discuss television shows, childhood sleepovers and Bruno even pulls out some clever lies in order to speed up impending coitus.

Because the actors throw themselves into the material, bringing charm to some truly dreadful dialogue, there is minor appeal to what is mostly a series of candidly filmed conversations that don’t always propel the story forward. The success here comes from the visible budgetary limitations and established chemistry, more so than the film itself, which has its moments, but is mostly plodding, sloppy and exceedingly uncomfortable.