Friends and Lovers

Director/Writer:	George Haas
	Lions Gate Film; R; 113 minutes
Release:	4/99
Cast:	Stephen Baldwin, Danny Nucci, George Newbern, Alison Eastwood, Claudia Schiffer, Robert Downey, Jr.

Friends and Lovers is a blithe comedy that derives its shallow soul from television's Friends. A group of twentysomethings head to the mountains of Utah for a weekend of sexual titterings and tepid humor. Maybe the movie wouldn't seem so stale if it were only 30 minutes long and sported several commercial interruptions. Maybe it would. There's the gay virgin (Danny Nucci), the innocent model wannabe (Claudia Schiffer) and her droll beefcake (Stephen Baldwin), the estranged son (George Newbern), whose father is hosting this sitcom-cum-cinema, and a handful of other neo-yuppie forgettables. Robert Downey, Jr.'s hearty performance as a questionably German ski instructor with a romantic interest in Schiffer's character warms up Friends and Lovers' Sno-Cone mush.