The romantic comedy The Sweet Life asks the pressing questions of “Why are nice, well-behaved hetero men misidentified as gay?” and “Do many women really prefer being treated badly?” The answers are probably related, although filmmakers Roy Frumkes and Rocco Simonelli never rally provide them. The Sweet Life (out on DVD) explores another facet of dating and couples through its hapless protagonist, Mike (James Lorinz), crippled at age 10 when the love of his young life disdained him in favor of his Alpha male brother, Frank, a boy already on his way to certification as a jerk.
“My confidence is completely shot,” Mike announces, wryly looking back on the debacle from the vantage of 30something adulthood. “If I like a woman she'll reject me out of hand,” he continues, treating us to the gallery of weirdoes he has dated as a result of his low expectations. Mike has been through a slew of psychotics, or at least neurotics, on his ill-starred search for happiness.
The Sweet Life is the sort of romantically-sexually self-deprecating screenplay Woody Allen wrote until recently. Its problem is in the delivery. Lorinz is no Woody (or even an Owen Wilson), and is too bland in this role to be funny. Joan Jett perks things up a bit as the biker chick he meets through a blind date.
