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The movie's conceit grows a bit stale even with a short running time, and ultimately the whole thing feels more like an acting workshop than a full-fledged human story.
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At the very least 28 Hotel Rooms, the first feature written and directed by Matt Ross, is an impressively executed acting exercise for Chris Messina and Marin Ireland.
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While Messina and Ireland are fine company, writer-director Matt Ross' conceit tires you out.
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In its own small way, by documenting the petty panic of two people who want to be together but are otherwise entangled, 28 Hotel Rooms is often masterful.
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Messina and Ireland thrive under that gaze, and dismaying affectations aside-the characters go needlessly unnamed - the movie articulates the enduring allure of a love defined, and heightened, by restrictions.
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Despite the familiar setup, this is no "Same Time, Next Year," what with its hot-sheets trysts, full-frontal flashes and frank language. But the brief - sometimes very brief - encounters glimpsed here between the film's leads and sole characters (billed only as "Man" and "Woman") are inventive and telling.
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You wonder if Hollywood is trying to make a point: sex is joyless, and best experienced by recognizable, and recognizably obnoxious people.
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Nov 6, 2012Not showing us every aspect of their lives is a fine, even novel, approach, but merely telling us about them instead feels like a fruitless middle ground.
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We're supposed to take their self-pity at face value, an impression that's emphasized by a grinding monotonous humorlessness.
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Lacking much dramatic or intellectual stimulation, it's ultimately a limp effort.