Sai che c'è di nuovo?

Madonna plays a women let down by one man too many. In a night of drunken excess, she sleep with her best friend - who happens to be gay. She is pregnant as a result and they decide to set up home as a family, remaining best friends as they take on the joint responsibilities of parenthood. Things get complicated as Madonna's character falls in love with a new suitor. Probably the most PC movie of the year. If any of the subject matter interests you, and especially if you like Madonna, go and see it. If well-told stories about nice gay men and children leave you cold, forget it. This doesn't take the Mickey out of gay people, neither does it sacrifice by way of caricature or cheesiness. Instead it raises real social questions about rights and responsibilities towards children, and without preaching.

I don't get it. The movie has a fairly good plot, phenomenal actors (okay, with the exception of Madonna) and an award-winning director. So why did it come out so flat and two-dimensional? Come on now... we can't blame it all on Madonna.

I was really looking forward to the release of this movie, but was so disappointed after viewing it. I think Madonna was great in "Body of Evidence" and "Who's That Girl?" is one of my favorite madcap comedies. But she just doesn't seem to bring any warmth to her character at all and let's face it -- her acting in this movie was about exciting as plain oatmeal. The other actors were great.

The writing leaves a bit to be desired in more than a few places. I think they could have handled it better, made it warmer in a lot of areas. I guess that and placing Madonna as the lead character hurt what could have been a sensitive and entertaining film.

Although praised for her roles in the likes of Desperately Seeking Susan and Evita, The Nest Best Thing sees Madonna returning to the form of such previous mishaps as Body of Evidence and Dick Tracey.

The film tracks the relationship between broody yoga teacher Abbie (Madonna) and her gay best friend Robert (Rupert Everett), who end up in bed together following a rather over-zealous Fourth of July celebration. Although Robert agrees to help raise the resulting child, things become problematic when, several years on, Abbie meets and falls in love with Ben (the vastly underwritten Benjamin Bratt), who asks her to settle down with him.

Although there is some on-screen chemistry between Madonna and Everett, the audience expects more, considering the twosome are real-life friends and basically playing themselves. Everett fares best, pulling out all the stops in a reprise of his previous gay role in 'My Best Friend's Wedding'. Madonna's performance, on the other hand, is constantly inhibited by her mega-star status. It is sadly impossible to forget that she is none other than Ms. Ciccone, meaning that her desperate-for-love character appears somewhat implausible.

The script is a clunker, rendering the first half-hour of the movie cliche-ridden and woodenly acted, as the actors have little to work with. To be fair, it does get better as it becomes less predictable, and it is a good move by director Schlesinger to avoid playing the conventional happy ending card, instead prompting the viewer to ponder for themselves the futures of Abbie, Robert, and their son, Sam (Malcolm Stumpf). This cannot, however, excuse several fatal blunders, including the fact the Next Best Thing suffers from an identity crisis, flailing wildly every which way from forced rom-com humour to courtroom drama, not helped by Abbie's sudden and bizarre personality change mid-film. Perhaps irresponsibly, the script also allows Sam (a rather old-looking 5 year old) little emotional reaction to the troubles between his parents.

Although watchable, with reasonable enough performances, the mediocre script fails to convince, leaving the viewer with a frustrated sense of what should have resulted from a potentially interesting Hollywood pitch.

The Next Best Thing casts Madonna as a free spirited soul (some stretch of casting there) who has a one night stand with an old friend and soul mate Rupert Everett. But that's not likely to happen too often as Everett is a gay man with whom she confides her innermost.

I think Everett's character must have been based on Roddy McDowall who was a confidante to many of the rich and glamorous and unlike that other gay man who did that as well, Truman Capote, McDowall never wrote any tell all memoirs.

It rarely happens in real life, but a blessed event came from that mating and Madonna and Everett decide to move in together, not marry, but raise the child as a mother and father with each leading their separate lives. It actually does work for a while.

Madonna really gets into the mother role and Everett's a great father figure. But he never forgets his social life with friends and lovers like Neil Patrick Harris and Mark Valley.

But then Madonna meets Benjamin Bratt who wants to get married and that puts an end to the arrangements.

The Next Best Thing while a sincere effort in its own way of showing the complicated problems that gays and lesbians have with the raising of children, their own children at that, it sadly degenerates into the kind of soap opera that one finds on the Lifetime Channel. It's not a horrible film, just will never be on anyone's ten best list.

Oh dear.

Don't get me wrong, I love Madonna as a singer and a bloody good one she is too. And she was good in Evita. But no matter how hard she tries she is still Madonna, and as 'Abbie' in this travesty of a film, she proves that she really should stick to the day job (i.e - singing)

I'm trying to be constructive, but this film is truly apalling. Admittedly, Rupert and Madonna are hindered by one of the worst, most hackneyed screen plays I have heard in many a year. Hear are just a few snippets of the trite, contrived, cliched dialogue:

"Being a parent takes more that DNA!!"

"I take sick companies and make them well"

"I miss him. He was totally me!"

The use of gay stereotypes is utterly apalling (I would be outraged if I were a gay man) the plot is dull and the characters are so thinly developed that there is no room for empathy. We learn next to nothing about the character of Abbie (nor do we care) and Rupert's Robert is simply a gay stereotype - I can't believe that he read the script and then agreed to accept the part. Perhaps he was feeling under the weather at the time and his judgement was impaired. Whatever the case, by the time the brat of a kid has his fate decided, you really could not care less what happened to him, Rupert or Madonna. All that stopped me hitting the fast forward button at regular intervals, was the unintentional, self parodic hilarity of this film. A prime example being the impromptu performance of 'American Pie' around the grave of one of the bloke's boyfriend's. Supposedly a poignant touch, this is unintentionally hilarious and has to be seen to be believed.

Avoid it at all costs, unless you have a fondness for seriously bad films, unintentional, self parodic humour, wooden, over-the-top acting, a wafer thin plot, characters who are little more than stereotypes and contrived dialogue. Need I go on?