Manhattan Romance

'Manhattan Romance' begins with film-maker Danny embarking on a documentary about relationships, which requires him to interview various acquaintances and strangers about their love lives. One of them is a manipulative neo-hippie tease called Theresa, who encourages him to give her topless massages while she talks about her poly-amorous life-style. Her flirting has Danny anticipating detours into her bedroom, but she keeps putting him off with vague excuses. In between these frustrating encounters, he visits his friend Carla and films her discussing her lesbian romance. When he complains to Carla about his unrequited desires for Theresa, she offers only amused eye-rolls and muted sympathy in response.

The film is Tom O'Brien's second feature as writer/producer/director/actor, and his contributions give the excellent cast plenty of space to create intriguing characters. The story takes some interesting twists and turns as Danny zigzags between his project and real life relationships. The boundary separating these two zones becomes increasingly blurred, leaving Danny unsure about his ability to connect with other people. 'Manhattan Romance' delivers sophisticated accessible entertainment, which is both playful and poignant, before the narrative unfolds to a satisfying conclusion.

A genuine modern tale. O'Brien takes the role of a gentle and nice guy with strength and depth. He has written dialogue for the messed up of today. His complicated guy actually is one of the most interesting male characters in a contemporary movie. He doesn't fall over for the strong and articulate women and holds his own. Being alone is part of his completeness and he doesn't see it as a problem. He bats off the usual gay slings so pointedly thrown at single guys today without a concern of personal intrusion. And he moves gracefully around complicated sexual people with ease. Scattered throughout are tiny snips of relationships as they fall, rise and find their centres. It's a talky movie and all the better for it.

A romantic movie that shows everyday romances in a more realistic way than the fairy tales we are so used too. Here we have people dealing with the problems that come when you are building a relationship with other. It can be that one prefers to be alone and not many people can challenge it, that one wants to start it with somebody who prefers to have no commitment or that one is in love with a friend.

The movie isn't bad. But it isn't great either. It started too slow for me and took too long before I felt a slight caring for the relationships between the people on the screen. Unfortunately it didn't make me care as much as it should.

The great parts about the movie are the acting. Katherine Waterston is absolutely perfect in her role. I almost fell in love with her myself and I am not a lesbian. And I absolutely loved the scene where Danny talks about the ending of movies. It kind of predicts the ending but also gives us so much more meaning for it.

I was looking for a date night movie with my boyfriend and I found this one online. I fell in love with this movie because of the way it approached all different kinds of love with complete acceptance and an attempt at understanding. There is a lesbian, a woman who is figuring out her sexuality, a straight male, and a straight female who only involves herself in open relationships. And none of these people are portrayed as anything but individuals, acknowledging the fascinating role sexuality plays in society today. As this movie went on, I found that I loved the dialogue and the interactions between all of the characters.

I'm not really that good at reviews, in fact this is the first one I write, but when I saw IMDb rating I felt oblige to do so.

This is great and very realistic film about love and everyone who is not brain dead should see it. The acting was very, very good. I completely and helplessly felt in love with Katherine Waterston, she was magnificent at least and from now on I'll be following her career very closely.

The actor, producer, director and writer Tom O'Brien made one hell of a movie, his performance as an actor was close to perfect and in my opinion. The whole documentary like theme was perfect for the purpose of the movie only one thing I can say - Respect!

P.S. Sorry about my poor English.