This is about a playboy type whose ego gets in the way when he discovers his best friend is marrying his former high school girlfriend. The entire story falls flat for anyone who went beyond high school because it is all about the inviolability of those allegiances and the heroes they raised. I found it impossible to like him. He resorts to his fists twice in the film simply because someone disagrees with him. All characters in this film including the women systematically include "fucking" in every sentence. Take away the nice homes and the trendy night spots, the recent showers and good grooming, and wouldn't you have a bunch of coughing, spitting, farting, possibly pimple-y-faced losers? The film did convey a sense of bravado, which is always a pleasure, but the excessive loyalty seemed servile. What was supposed to be a comedy turned into a long groaning attempt to overcome a mole hill in the road of social development.
All through the film I diligently tried unsuccessfully to find it amusing on the basis of its description as a romantic comedy, but only in the final moments did it occur to me the film makers might have been trying for social realism, eg., Saturday Night and Sunday Morning or Alfie. To paraphrase the words of Lloyd Bentsen: 'Mr. Putschoegl, you are no Tony Richardson.'
