What Love Is

Cuba Gooding Jr. is the eternal romantic and perfect gentleman who gets dumped on Valentine's Day. Instead of a romantic night with the woman he loves, he winds up the leading man in the world's most insufferably pretentious unproduced play, with his living room as the stage. As it conveniently resembles a classic sitcom set, you half expect a studio audience to break into applause every time a character makes his (and later her) entrance right on cue. Then they open their mouths and take turns delivering excruciatingly self-serving monologues that writer/director/co-star Mars Callahan imagines pass for insight on the modern male animal. There are no conversations to be had, merely colliding speeches that ultimately work over every tired cliché about men and women and sex and love. Matthew Lillard, Sean Astin, Andrew Daly and Callahan provide the male stereotypes, and Gina Gershon, Anne Heche and Tamala Jones do the (dis)honors for the women. When the stage clears, all that's left is the unpleasant odor of all that hot air. Features commentary by Callahan and his producers, and a making-of featurette.