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'The Last Kiss': Questioning life and love at 30

"The Last Kiss" could be the strongest deterrent for people thinking of falling in love, and a disturbing tonic for those already caught in its mean, mercurial clench. Survivors who have extracted themselves, or have been expelled, from a messy affair will smirk and nod knowingly. This is a date movie for masochists, for couples willing to look romance in the eye and come away at best concerned, at worst very discouraged.

For a romantic dramedy starring Zach Braff, that heartthrob for nerds, "The Last Kiss" dwells in surprisingly dark places (even the skies are blotted gray). And it's the better for it. Braff has spanned two spectrums: rubber-faced mugging on television's "Scrubs" and cloying self-pity in "Garden State," the 2004 film he wrote, directed and starred in.

DreamWorks SKG 'The Last Kiss' 3 out of 5 stars The verdict: Happily ever after, this isn't. Director: Tony Goldwyn Starring: Zach Braff, Jacinda Barrett, Rachel Bilson, Tom Wilkinson, Blythe Danner Run time: 115 minutes Release date: Sept. 15, 2006 Rating: R for sexuality, nudity and language. See showtimes On the web Official movie site View the trailer    Trailers require Quicktime Rate 'The Last Kiss'   Go see it   Make it a matinee   Wait to rent   Don't bother Voter Limit: Once per Hour View Poll Results

Here he's not allowed to fall back on puppy-dog charms, showcasing his abilities as both an affable, low-key comedian and the angst-torn young man. There's a hint of Dustin Hoffman in Braff, smart and straight-up but emotionally at sea, and you root for him.

In "The Last Kiss," Braff and his friends represent the many states of love, most of them unsteady. There's the dumped guy (Michael Weston) who won't get over his ex; the guy whose marriage is crumbling like a stale cookie (Casey Affleck); the swinging single bartender (Eric Christian Olsen); and Michael (Braff), who's too terrified to marry his girlfriend of three years, Jenna (Jacinda Barrett), even though she's in her first trimester. Childhood pals in Wisconsin, the men are all about to turn 30, which they view more as a leap into the abyss than a step into the glories of adulthood.

"It seems so final," Braff's Michael repeats when inevitably pressured to wed. Marriage means the end of surprises in life, he says. His anxious dithering leads him to cheat on Jenna with a manipulative co-ed (Rachel Bilson of "The O.C."), who's roughly a decade his junior.

To make the tryst seem more irrational, the filmmakers lay on thick the mutual lovey-dovey between Michael and Jenna. Early on, there are too many clammy exchanges — "Isn't she beautiful?" "Not as beautiful as you" — that stretch plausibility and are clearly devices to amplify the impending relationship blowup.

In many ways "The Last Kiss" is a by-the-book romantic dramedy, but it makes some brave choices. The film's gaze is hard and serious, yet sensitive and probing. Director Tony Goldwyn and virtuoso screenwriter Paul Haggis ("Million Dollar Baby," "Crash") approach the familiar terrain with a grounded realism and perceptive intensity that echo classics of the tough-love genre "Scenes from a Marriage," "Kramer vs. Kramer" and "Ordinary People." Though flecked with organic humor, it's a tart retort to the recent glib comedy "The Breakup." (It's based on the 2001 Italian film "L'Ultimo Bacio.")

The multiple characters fashion a mosaic of interpersonal tribulations, including those between Jenna's parents, played by the magnificent Blythe Danner and Tom Wilkinson, whose believable, broken-in chemistry affords the movie a solid foundation. From Braff on down, the cast shines, directed by Goldwyn with a clear vision of the film's tone, which he deftly sustains. Barrett as Jenna is the revelation. Her meltdown upon learning of Braff's indiscretion is as explosively powerful as Julia Roberts' in the similarly heartsick "Closer."

As he showed in "Crash," Haggis is a master at orchestrating crowds of characters and calibrating bundled plot lines, striking a rattling array of emotional notes. In tiny doses, his script dispenses the wisdom of literature. His weak spot is melodrama, and "The Last Kiss" goes soft as it reaches its end.

But little can dilute the movie's honest message that love, even healthy love, is misery. The movie takes us to an unresolved place, where endings are rarely happy. Even for the lucky ones, they're usually bittersweet.