Born Guilty is the story of a lonely and frazzled New York social worker (Rosanna Arquette) who can’t resist the urge to intervene in her son Marty’s life. Meanwhile, Marty (Jay Devore) is trying to be creative in his advertising career and manage a romantic relationship at the same time, on top of constantly talking his mother off the ledge.
When Marty’s free- spirited Aussie pal Rawl (David Coussins) shows up, Marty hires Rawl to see Judy and “restore her to health” — any way it takes. Director Max Heller’s heartfelt, ensemble comedy is filled with wry, sly, funny and sexy connections reminiscent of Nora Ephron, Neil Simon, Woody Allen, The Farrelly Brothers and Rob Reiner’s romantic concoctions.
Film Review: Born Guilty
he key to every successful comedy, romantic and otherwise, is having central characters who are likable or at least relatable to some degree.
It’s a basic concept that’s lost on writer-director Max Heller’s “Born Guilty,” a shrill urban relationship satire whose lead protagonists are so insufferably self-centered and whiny, there’s little hope for redemption.
Exhibit One: Judith Weiss (Rosanna Arquette), a social worker and lonely, bitter New York divorcee with no evident filter, who doesn’t see any problem with offering obnoxious, unsolicited advice to random couples she encounters on the street.
Exhibit Two: Her smug, entitled, equally charmless son, Marty (Jay Devore, doing his best Adam Sandler), a Los Angeles-based junior ad exec — an apple who clearly hasn’t fallen far from the tree.
Although a semblance of a plot eventually kicks in — Marty pays his free-spirited, globe-traveling Aussie buddy, Rawl (David Coussins), to romance his needy, smothering mom with unintended results — Heller, a TV editor in his feature filmmaking debut, buries it under the cartoonish performances and a grating score that sounds like it was lifted from a ’60s sitcom.
It all culminates in an unearned, sins-of-the-parents confrontation in which Marty, rather than taking ownership of his screw-ups, instead blames Judith for his pronounced character flaws.
While the pair obviously deserve each other, they manage to do nothing to deserve a crucial shred of audience empathy.
Born Guilty (2018)
Directed by: Max Heller
Starring: Jay Devore, David Coussins, Rosanna Arquette, Keesha Sharp, Anna Lore, Jay Klaitz, John Lavelle, Xander Berkeley, Lora Bofill, Marissa Caprielian, Laura Bozzone
Screenplay by: Max Heller
Production Design by: Jim Priest, Brian Tubbs
Cinematography by: Kenneth Stipe
Film Editing by: Max Heller, Justin Kavoussi
Costume Design by: Nancy Wei
Set Decoration by: Laury Grea, Santiago Meyer
Art Direction by: Kamil Korus
Music by: David Ricard
Distributed by: Freestyle Digital Media
Release Date: May 11, 2018
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