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DOCTOR BENNY Rating:  (out of 5 stars)Director: Nolan H. Lebovitz Producer: Nolan H. Lebovitz Writer: Nolan H. Lebovitz Director of Photography: Kenneth Wiatrak Cast: Timothy Dowling, Jennifer Jostyn, Jeff Cahill, Josh Holloway Visit the IMDB page for full cast and crew |
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Review by: Warren
Curry
4/28/03
A movie about a 28-year-old male virgin gynecologist is definitely a novel comic concept. But when execution is lacking, novelty is often times all that's left and merely a premise is never enough to carry a film. First-time feature director Nolan H. Lebovitz came up with a good enough blueprint of a protagonist and has an earnest story in mind, but his attempt to marry this story with irreverent humor marks Doctor Benny as a film without an identity.
Ben Lewis (Timothy Dowling), groomed to be a doctor from childhood, spends his days inspecting the most intimate part of the female anatomy, but for some reason has no idea how to deal with women on any sort of social level. He's even gone so far to join a support group for adult virgin men, but this type of reinforcement still can't make him a hit with the ladies. When he seeks the help of a sex guru named Pheb (Josh Holloway), who actually teaches a private class to help inept men learn how to please the opposite sex, Ben's luck changes drastically. He begins to take advantage of his patients (with their consent) and quickly sheds the derisive slang labels of "lork" and "sooser." For all of his newly learned sexual prowess, Ben is still a good person at heart and when he's given a resident assistant named Becky (Jennifer Jostyn), the young man realizes that true love is more important than a string of sexual conquests.
The film's sense of humor is anything but sophisticated, and if this movie would have completely thrown caution to the wind, it may have achieved more of a Farrelly brothers-like success. It's difficult to filter "R" rated humor through a "PG" story and that's a big part of Doctor Benny's confusion. Lebovitz misses out on the opportunity to use this comic framework to offer more pointed commentary about the often-ridiculous nature of contemporary relationships and gender roles and opts strictly to try to make a broad comedy with a heart.
None of the actors make a great impression with Dowling being a bit too reactive, although that's largely the nature of his character. Jennifer Jostyn does a good job with an underwritten character and she is well cast in her role. Lebovitz directs the film smoothly and drives the pace appropriately but his script betrays him in the end. A story beat in the third act, in which Ben is asked to pass Pheb's final love test by picking up a high school girl at a keg party, especially, borders on calamity. It's interesting that in the press notes, Lebovitz states that he's proud of the "tasteful manner" of his work in this film, because in this scene he essentially treats what appears will be statutory rape with a quick wink and wry smile. This scene's perhaps not as offensive as the above description might lead you to believe, but it's also pretty far from what I would describe as "tasteful."
Doctor Benny is definitely not a chore to sit through and does deliver a laugh every now and then, but for the most part the humor is purely juvenile and the dialogue lacks snap (a sign of a good comedy is usually one that has an abundance of "quotable" lines). The film is too innocuous to truly dislike, but also too forgettable to really warrant having any opinion about.
(An Outrider Pictures release. Opens in LA on 5/2/2003.)
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