He loves me; he loves me not....

This enjoyable "woman's picture" about judging relationships and finding the right (or most dependable) man is instructive, and skirts the fringes between TV's Sex and the City, of which it's an offshoot, and a compendium of lighthearted how-to relationship advice, which Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo's eponymous source book is. And the advice doesn't stop, even as the end credits roll.

As a movie, it's an ensemble piece, and the actors, including Ben Affleck, Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, Jennifer Connolly, and Scarlett Johansson, whom you might or might not want to watch for two hours, work well together and are perfectly fine on screen only a few minutes at a time. A couple of them, Ginnifer Goodwin and Justin Long, have never been better or gotten such a good chance to show their skills. The great thing is that the screenplay doesn't strain to exaggerate anybody's traits for laughs, or turn maudlin, or go on long digressions about buying clothes. No plugs for Manolo Blahnik.

At the center is the needy, somewhat desperate but essentially warm-hearted young woman called Gigi (Goodwin), who is in dire need of advice. A bit of the Cyrano thing happens. Perhaps Alex (Justin Long, very successful in his big role here), the jaded man who warns her to stop hoping when there's no hope, is not disinterested. She thinks every man's polite "hope to see you again" and proffered phone number mean something. Alex assures her they do not. She learns to give up dreams based on anecdotes about exceptions to this rule--those rare guys who had to be prodded, but then responded, or waited a year, yet returned to become the perfect mate.

There are two couples whose hitherto stable relationships develop cracks in them as the various unattached guys and gals weave in and out of the scene in search of a real connection. Beth (Aniston) and Neil (Affleck) have lived together for seven years but Neil won't tie the knot. He says it's against his principles. After discussing this with her girlfriends, Beth forces the issue, which leads to Neil's moving out and camping on his sailboat. Aniston's real life personal history gives her sense of being dumped a subtext; but she's not really dumped. Ultimately Affleck shines as a classy guy with a genuine code of decency. They're the couple that carries the most conviction and they have the most touching moment.

Janine (Connolly) is married to Ben (Bradley Cooper) and neurotically obsessing over the rehab of an old city row house. The picture is set in Baltimore and is true to the urban landscapes and night spots of Charm City. It also features some funny to-the-camera anecdotes by real ladies about men's tricks. Janine's also going wacko with suspicion that Ben is secretly smoking Amercan Spirit cigarettes on the rehab site, and lying to her that he's quit smoking for good. Then Ben meets voluptuous yoga instructor Anna (Johansson) at a supermarket checkout and though he takes a while to give in, it's lust at first sight. The pretext for their being connected at first is his helping her with her singing career. As in Vicky, Cristina, she's really just an oversexed young woman "finding herself," and when the story ends, she's planning a wander-year in India. She's a slut, but both Ben and Janine have goofed as spouses and Anna is only the catalyst of their marital meltdown.

Running through the piece is Gigi's relationship with Alex, who runs a big bar called the City Club and first meets her when she's had a date with a real estate agent called Conor (Kevin Connolly). Gigi thinks Conor is interested; Alex assures her he is not. Gigi keeps calling on Alex for tips on her various dates. Reading the signals doesn't come easy for her and Alex is always ready with the advice. One key item: "spark" or its lack don't mean anything. They're just male inventions to justify fickleness.

Conor sold Janine and Ben the house they're rehabbing, which makes him seem reliable. Low and behold, he turns out to be a sex buddy and longtime pal of Anna, and to hanker for more with her. But Anna is busy getting crazy with Ben. Conor is looking for gay customers for these downtown rehabs, so he runs an ad in the Blade via Mary (Drew Barrymore). Mary's gay cohorts at the Blade also offer advice; she's not unlike Gigi in her men problems. But one gay couple assert that they can't give straights advice, because the signals among gay men are completely different, and much more rapidly understood. "I want you" or "I don't" is about the size of it.

Six of these characters wind up happy together, which is tilting the odds heavily to the upside; but this is a movie. As one fellow audience member said going out, "I'm glad it had a happy ending, because it was getting depressing for a while there." Yes, and relationships are a messy business, which the two couples' troubles and the movie's whole middle section show. A lot of them don't end in happiness. The movie only offers hope and realism. It provides a little advice about commitment, judging a partner, and evaluating the first date. It doesn't consider all the factors that make for love or a good relationship.

But the very qualities that keep this from being a great movie, it's lack of depth and failure to be witty, make it valid and honest as a look at dating and relationship-forming and save it from the utter mediocrity or bad taste it could have fallen into. Jane Austen or even Sex and the City it's not. But it's also not an endless self-centered monologue but a sensible guide to wising up.

Boring elements are the obligatory, but unnecessary, glossy American-movie wedding, complete with boorish speech by a relative. The picture steers clear of even more boring specifics of nowhere dates except for a man, appropriately appearing at that wedding, who attempts to woo poor Gigi by lecturing her on his career as a male witch.

_________________
©Chris Knipp. Blog: http://chrisknipp.blogspot.com/.