The Lonely Guy

As mentioned a few posts below, I got the Steve Martin: The Wild and Crazy Comedy Collection DVD box set. I watched The Lonely Guy because I hadn't seen it before and it's sitting here. Based on a Neil Simon play, the film stars Steve Martin as Larry Hubbard, a man who goes home one day to his girlfriend to find her in bed with her lover, Raoul, and informs him that he will be moving out, just as soon as he takes out the garbage. Larry becomes a "lonely guy".


Also starring a young and barely recognizable Charles Grodin as Warren, an oft-times 'lonely guy' who becomes Larry's guide and mentor to the life of a 'lonely guy'. The lonely guy is a sort of code for a secret club of lonely men. There are certain rules to the club and things all lonely men learn. Warren teaches Larry things like how to eat alone in a restaurant without arousing suspicion from other patrons that you are a lonely guy (pretend you are a restaurant critic). He also teaches him about the lonely guy must haves (a fern plant, dog) and some of the lonely guy hangouts (the best bridge to jump from, The Lonely Guy store on 81st and Lex). Larry meets Iris (Judith Ivey), a flaky, friendly, interesting woman who immediately identifies Larry as a lonely guy. Iris piques Larry's interest and he soon begins chasing her. The film's narrative follows the normal plot outline rules with obstacles to him finding Iris and "getting the girl" and a small subplot with his friend Warren.


This film is funny, but unfortunately suffers from a lack of identity. It doesn't quite work. The film has a voice over narration at the beginning of the film from Larry introducing himself and his situation to the audience. Fine. A little bit into the film, now Larry is directly addressing the camera and looking right into it. Okay. Then other times the voice over and Larry directly addressing the camera are glaringly obviously missing. Think of the voice over narration part of Clueless, then think of the part of Annie Hall when Alvy (Woody Allen) talks right to the camera, then think of any other movie where a character is walking through the park in a long shot with no dialogue or music. Now think of them all in the same movie. All three can be good and effective apart, but not so much when they are all are used together. The humour is very funny and surreal-like (like when Larry is being seated at a busy restaurant and the whole restaurant stares at him in silence while the room darkens and a blue spotlight follows him to his table) and Martin and Grodin both give good performances (like when they sit in the park discussing why bums always have a lot hair). The soundtrack is pretty outdated. Yes, I realize that it was released in 1984, that would be why, but it's not even dated in a "it's so bad it's good" kind of way.

In spite of all that it's okay and would be worth checking out if you're a Steve Martin fan and have never seen it. From the part of the film where Iris tells Larry it would never work because they're perfect for each other......

Iris: I need someone who I don't care a damn about. Someone mean and unfeeling and rotten.
Larry: I could be that! Just give me a day or two to work on it......I mean sure we have a few problems like not having sex, but we don't have to have sex, there's plenty of other things we can do. We can go to motels and listen to other people have sex!"

More ramblings to come........