April's Shower

Pleasantly surprised! I thought this was going to be another soggy, predictable, boring lesbian coming out and romance movie. This movie was poignant and hilarious, with many plot twists and memorable lines. It was not entirely light-hearted. One of the characters is the mother of a baby who has died, for example. Including this subplot sent the message that even someone who has suffered such a tragedy is still an ordinary person who is part of life and able to experience laughter and love. The love story at the center of the film was passionate, imperfect and deep. Above all, the movie was polymorphously sexy. One particularly charming quality that this movie possesses is the portrayal of romantic love between two people in the midst of a loving community of friends, all of whom are having their own struggles of the heart. It hit the some of the same postmodern romantic lesbian comedy notes as "Kissing Jessica Stein." I appreciated the fact that many of the characters were clearly meant to be Italian-American (this was evident to me even before they were "outed" as Italian in the film), with references to Catholicism and pizza and construction without descending into flat stereotypes, kind of like the way Jessica Stein's Jewishness was treated in that movie. Lizzie-20 needs to lighten up and look up "camp" in the dictionary.

This is my go to guilty pleasure movie if I'm ever feeling sad, or sick or just want something comforting to watch. I love all the characters and the craziness that is the storyline. Cute, funny, comforting, crazy, what more could you want? It's an easy movie to just get lost in.

This movie was a lot of things, funny was not one of them. It seems like the writer took all possible stereotypes, wrote individual story lines, and then shuffled them together not paying attention to what would actually work. This movie actually would have worked better as a drama. No part of it was even remotely funny, let ALONE hilarious (as one reviewer suggested). I would never categorize this movie as a comedy. The "jokes" (I didn't even notice any?) should have been deleted and they should have just done it as a heartfelt love story (which would have worked). Some stories took forever to get going and then played out in 2 seconds. Others were just incredibly unbelievable. I frequently found myself doing a face palm at how embarrassed I was for the people involved. I can't even say this was a good effort. It felt like no one actually read the script or watched it after editing to see how it all came together. I hope this was a first effort and her films have learned from this one's mistakes.

Wow this was bad. The only reason I rented it in the first place was because I went to school with Lara Harris (she plays Kelly, and what a horrible English accent! Stick to modeling, Lara!) I couldn't even get through the whole thing and didn't even realize it was about lesbians until I came here to read the reviews. That's how bad it was. I rented it via Netflix and 20 minutes into it, ejected the smelly thing from my DVD and immediately mailed it back. Ack, it was awful! The characters were one-dimensional at best. Porn star named Spring Dawn? Gay sidekick? Obnoxious materialistic straight friend? Slacker brother? Dare I go on? I didn't even see the main character April or her fiancé Paulie on screen because I didn't get that far. As God is my witness, I shall never rent another movie without reading more reviews!

My review is motivated by what appears to be some negative over analysis of a delightful little film. As they say, "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar."

I found this film very easy to follow. Intended or not, this film has a decided message. We are all people, human beings with prejudices, frailties, strengths, weaknesses, wisdom, or not. Through it all, Doolin shows us we all have the ability to understand, if we want to, and the ability to change. Change our thinking, our perceptions, and how we choose to handle life's little curves.

To accomplish this, Doolin uses stereotypes. Images and ideologies we have all seen, witnessed or felt. We have quite a few somewhat colorful and interesting, if not fun characters in this film, covering a good part of the questions and attitudes we usually see in society. The conservative religious elitist, liberals, gay and lesbian, all juxtaposed against a canvas of a wedding shower, which unexpectedly reveals greater issues beneath the surface.

Doolin handles such deftly,and considering the issues discussed, same sex marriage & gay relationships,some rather heavy issues, she gets her point across with humor and a lightness which makes it easy to appreciate.

Doolin makes no preachy commentary of the subject matter;l She exposes the issue of gay relationships, sex and loving a person of the same sex for what it is. All of us want to feel close to another, and want to be loved. How it manifests, and comes to be, is only as it is. (and) as it is, is really no big deal. All the fuss, a lot to do about nothing.

Trish Doolin is a very talented writer/directer/actor. if you are secure enough in your own self, and don't mind watching a comedy with gay subject matter, you may find this film quite enjoyable.

My parting advice to other critics, Don't over think it. It's really pretty simple.