Single, Urban, Educated and Aimless

This movie, “Obvious Child,” wants to be a gutsy, comedic film about a young woman who decides, rather quickly and without much agonizing, to have an abortion. Leaving behind the sad, shocking abortions of “Dirty Dancing” and “Cabaret,” and even the women who decide to give birth in “Juno” and “Knocked Up,” writer-director Gillian Robespierre's first feature-length movie is unburdened by social or political cant. It is also clumsily written, clichéd and self-indulgent. The film centers on Donna Stern (played by real-life comedian Jenny Slate, whose gig at “Saturday Night Live” was terminated after just a year when she blurted out a forbidden expletive on a live broadcast). Donna is a barely-employed millennial from New York City's Upper West Side, a drifting daughter — she works part-time in a secondhand bookstore and does standup comedy on sporadic nights in Red Hook, Brooklyn — of the kind of Jewish intellectuals so beloved by Woody Allen. But comedy, “Child” shows us, is a matter of generational definition. Donna’s comedy is made from over-sharing details of her love life, sex life, even bodily functions and sounds, with an audience of fellow millennials. Almost 30, Donna is a mess. She loses her job and boyfriend — he dumps her after first cheating on her — in the same week. Then charming, preppie college man Max (Jake Lacy, whose wide-eyed expression suggests he wonders what he is doing in this film) wanders into the cramped comedy club where she is performing. They meet, they drink, they have sex — after a lengthy scene of abandoned dancing as they strip off more and more clothes — and she leaves him asleep after sunrise. Five weeks later, she discovers she is pregnant. No big deal. Donna decides to have an abortion during a frank and funny discussion with her roommate Nellie (the wonderful Gaby Hoffman, who plays crazy Caroline on TV’s “Girls”), one of the best scenes in the movie. Donna tells her mother (Polly Draper), who, predictably, reveals that she, too, had an abortion before she was married. But Donna doesn’t tell Max. He only finds out when he returns to the comedy club in the middle of her rambling, confessional monologue about being pregnant and having scheduled her abortion for Valentine's Day. He leaves, but of course shows up the next day with Valentine flowers and wants to go with her to the clinic. He does. That’s it. No one could accuse Robespierre of being deep. But there is a realness to the film, a sense of the aimlessness of many single, urban, college-educated 20- and early-30-year-olds. And there are moments of genuine humor: Donna is actually funny in her everyday conversations — she describes herself as the menorah that would be placed on top of a Christmas tree — and a brief scene with Max trying on Crocs is hilarious. But the meandering script is filled with truisms, no character but Donna’s is even partially developed, others represent the worst of rom-com clichés, and good actors are simply wasted. Only Slate, who is in every scene, gets to show her appealing talent, range and even vulnerability. Clearly Robespierre and Slate hoped to emulate “Girls,” Lena Dunham's incomparable satire of millennial female angst. But Robespierre is too limited to match Dunham's transgressive comedy. “Obvious Child” never overcomes its crudeness of script and structure to become the refreshing, satisfying film it might have been. “Obvious Child” is rated R for language. It is playing at The Moviehouse in Millerton, NY, and elsewhere.