Some Girls

Quirky to the point of distraction, Some Girls follows a smarmy college student (Patrick Dempsey’s Michael) as he travels to Quebec to spend the holidays with on-again-off-again girlfriend Gabriella (Jennifer Connelly). Michael quickly finds himself confronted with Gabriella’s unreasonably eccentric family, which includes – among others – a pair of slutty sisters (Sheila Kelley’s Irenka and Ashley Greenfield’s Simone), a father (Andre Gregory) with a penchant for nudity, and a bedridden grandmother (Lila Kedrova) who mistakes Michael for her dead husband. Screenwriter Rupert Walters’ refusal to infuse Gabriella’s brood with even a hint of authenticity quickly lends the movie a distinctly interminable vibe, as the viewer – faced with the prospect of spending more than a few minutes in the company of these ridiculously broad caricatures – is forced to find other ways to amuse themselves for the duration of the film’s overlong running time. Dempsey’s self-conscious, downright obnoxious performance certainly doesn’t help matters, nor does the egregiously deliberate pace with which director Michael Hoffman has imbued the proceedings. Connelly’s expectedly charismatic work notwithstanding, Some Girls primarily comes off as an exercise in irritation that possesses exceedingly little in the way of positive attributes.

* out of ****