The Last Kiss

What words make every self-respecting single man approaching the age of 30 break out into a cold sweat? "Receding hairline"? No. "Mutual funds"? Nada. "My parents are here. I'd like you to meet them." Bingo. Apparently these words, when spoken by a woman, confer so much terror that men will literally leave the country in order to avoid hearing them ever again.

Such is the state of mankind in The Last Kiss, a movie poised to resonate with the denizens of a modern romantic terrain wherein commitment is the province of women and stoics and most men exist in a perpetual state of wanderlust.

Starring Zach Braff of TV's Scrubs, The Last Kiss introduces us to Michael (Braff) and Jenna (Jacinda Barrett) as they announce to her parents Anna and Stephen (Blythe Danner and Tom Wilkinson) that she's pregnant. It's clear that after the 3-year-relationship of the younger couple, the older couple is expecting an engagement announcement, not a baby announcement. And while the excitement around the table is genuine, the announcement has clearly uncovered simmering discontentment within both couples.

Zach Braff as Michael, and Jacinda Barrett as Jenna

For Michael, the center of the story, life is just about perfect. He's almost 30. He's got a great job, good friends he's known since grade school, and a beautiful, intelligent, funny girlfriend. As he says, Jenna is just the kind of woman you want to settle down with. And yet, when fatherhood looms, the idea of settling down seems more like a drawn-out death sentence. Cue cute and flirty girl at a wedding reception (Rachel Bilson as Kim), and temptation to find potentially greener pastures becomes tangible. Will he or won't he?

Meanwhile, Michael's friends are in various stages of dysfunction in their own relationships. One's marriage is dissolving under the pressure of parenthood, one just had his heart broken by a long-time girlfriend, and the third has just found the woman of his dreams—one who will have hot, no-strings-attached sex with him. On the eve of another friend's wedding, they all wonder whether their lives are basically over at the ripe age of 29—their lust for uncomplicated women and their lust for the freedom of youth are often one in the same.

Tom Wilkinson and Blythe Danner play Jenna's parents

It's in this milieu that Michael contemplates the specter of spending the rest of his life with Jenna. He tells her he'll be willing to consider marriage when she can come up with three couples that she knows personally who have been together for longer than five years. She can only come up with her parents and a pair of ducks ("They mate for life!").

Needless to say, Jenna is devastated when her parents' marriage visibly implodes. The juxtaposition of Anna and Stephen's 30-year marriage and the attitudes that shape it against Michael and Jenna's relationship provide some of this film's most poignant insight. However, the full potential of this dynamic goes largely unfulfilled due to what seems like a few missing scenes that could have provided some helpful context in which to place the actions of both couples.

Best friends Kenny, Chris, Izzy, and Michael all face relationship crises

What-am-I-going-to-do-with-my-life angst isn't new territory for Braff, who channeled similar verve in the lauded indie flick, 2004's Garden State, which he wrote, directed, and stared in. And much like Garden State, it's going to be tempting for some to herald The Last Kiss as a movie for our moment, a cinematic snapshot of the way we live and love now. This is true insofar as it captures the affects of our prolonged adolescence (30 is the new 21!) and our idolization of youth (read: no one wants to be an adult) on the institution of marriage. The movie also illuminates the unsteady foundations so many relationships seem to rest upon these days, regardless of their duration (as evidenced by the increasing number of marriages dissolving after 20-plus years).

And yet, the movie often transitions clumsily between comedy and drama, and at times the characters act out of motivations that seem absurdly skewed. I saw The Last Kiss less than a week after my own 29th birthday. Given that I and many of my friends are still single while many of my married friends feel like they're hacking through new territory as they figure out what it means to love their spouses well, the questions about the nature of commitment that drive this movie are certainly not lost on me. Still, I found it hard to understand the mindset in which having a child with a person involved less commitment than marriage. As in, "Yes, we'll have a child together, but no, I'm not ready to marry you." I don't think you have to disapprove of premarital sex to think that this delineation doesn't make much practical sense.

Fretting over his commitment to Jenna, Michael begins an affair with Kim (Rachel Bilson, right)

As in Garden State, the soundtrack for The Last Kiss is a sort of defacto cast member and provides an engaging backdrop for the story. If only the story were more engaging. Flawed characters alone don't make for remarkable storytelling and while all of the performances are strong in and of themselves, the script could have used some of the aforementioned context to more deeply invest the audience in the lives of these couples. This cinematic sin by omission is especially odd given that the script was adapted (from a popular Italian movie) by Paul Haggis, hot off dramatic heavy-hitters Million Dollar Baby and Crash.

In the end, I think the movie would have also done well to balance the romantic angst it presents with at least one couple that was cheerfully together and had a healthy relationship over a long run. Yes, divorce rates are high. But I still think, on occasion, boys turn into men and marry women they stick with for better and for worse. I choose to think that, on the whole, men want committed relationships and women don't become shrill when you slip a ring on their finger. And while marriage certainly is hard work, I also chose to hope that people really can live, if not always happily, joyfully ever after. How very (old) Hollywood of me.

Talk About It

1. In The Last Kiss women often dangled their seeming lack of a need for commitment in front of the men they hoped to woo—and the men took the bait. But to a woman, it was a farce. All of them wanted more the next morning, leaving the impression that what men and women really want (freedom versus commitment) are fundamentally at odds with each other. Do you think this is truly the case? Read Genesis What affect do you think the curse at the end of the chapter has on ongoing relations between men and women?
   
   
2. Do you think Michael needed to be with Kim in order to realize that he really wanted to be with Jenna? Do you think this realization was genuine or the knee-jerk reaction of a guilty person.
   
   
3. Why do you think Anna returned to Stephen? What sort of history do you think this couple shares?
   
   
4. Do you think Jenna's streak of perfectionism affected Michael's ability to honestly grapple with the decision to commit? Why or why not?
   
   
5. What do you think Jenna and Michael's future holds?

The Family Corner

The Last Kiss features a number of sex scenes (at least four, including one between two women) that are arguably gratuitous and explicit. The rest of the movie is populated with more casual references to sex and sexual innuendo. Affairs abound, as does profanity.

Photos © Copyright DreamWorks

Copyright © 2006 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

What Other Critics Are Saying

Zach Braff made the leap from television sitcom star ("Scrubs") to feature film writer/director/leading man with Garden State a few years ago.

Now he's back as a leading man in The Last Kiss, but this time it's Tony Goldwyn in the director's chair, with a screenplay written by Oscar-winner Paul Haggis, who wrote Million Dollar Baby and Crash.

Based on L'Ultimo bacio, a film by Gabriel Muccino, The Last Kiss is about a young man whose life is thrown into confusion when his girlfriend Jenna (Jacinda Barrett) reveals that she's pregnant. What's a guy to do? Well, fall in love with a flirtatious college girl (Rachel Bilson), of course!

Lisa Ann Cockrel (Christianity Today Movies) writes, "[I]t's going to be tempting for some to herald The Last Kiss as a movie for our moment, a cinematic snapshot of the way we live and love now. This is true insofar as it captures the affects of our prolonged adolescence (30 is the new 21!) and our idolization of youth (read: no one wants to be an adult) on the institution of marriage. The movie also illuminates the unsteady foundations so many relationships seem to rest upon these days, regardless of their duration (as evidenced by the increasing number of marriages dissolving after 20-plus years)."

"And yet," she adds, "the movie often transitions clumsily between comedy and drama, and at times the characters act out of motivations that seem absurdly skewed. … In the end, I think the movie would have also done well to balance the romantic angst it presents with at least one couple that was cheerfully together and had a healthy relationship over a long run."

Christopher Lyon (Plugged In) says the filmmakers "can be lauded for showing masculine immaturity for what it is: selfish, fearful and weak. Whether at 20, 30 or 40, most guys have struggled with the idea of trading independence for commitment, domestic responsibility for lost youth. … What's frustrating, then, is the filmmakers' determination to display graphic extramarital sex scenes as part of the package. It's almost as if they're saying, 'See how great wanton sex can be; what a jerk you'd be to do this.' Worse, the commitment of marriage itself is nearly discounted."

David DiCerto (Catholic News Service) says, "In holding up a mirror to postmodern love and its accompanying anxieties, Goldwyn does provide some modest observations about flawed humanity—especially the way we learn from our mistakes and how actions have consequences—but, on a whole, the characters read as more selfish than sympathetic."

Many mainstream critics are ready to kiss this one off.

Christa Banister (Crosswalk) says, "what are supposed to be 'real' and 'gritty' portrayals of modern relationship woes come off as nothing more than the rotten fruit that results when people only focus on themselves. And if the one-dimensional, whiny characters weren't bad enough, there's the horrendous dialogue that's as clunky as most 16-year-olds' first car."