This has to be one of Steve Martin's worst movies, and the main reason is that he's working from a hackneyed script created by Neil Simon, along with a couple of TV sitcom writers. The whole thing seems like it came out of a meeting where a staff of writers for a variety show were trying to come up with funny situations involving Lonely Guys. Some of the situations would have worked nicely as a blackout on a TV show, but in a feature film they just seem like unconnected building blocks.
The script doesn't play to Martin's strengths (wacky physical humor or surrealistic verbal humor), so he's playing a role that any bland actor - picture someone like Tony Roberts - could have done almost as well. Charles Grodin is merely an annoyance as the one-dimensional geeky lonely guy, and the main female characters are also static and uninteresting.
Even Jerry Goldsmith, who has beefed up many a marginal movie with a good score, goes vanilla here and gives us a bunch of goopy 80s cues, sounding like Dave Grusin on Prozac. The vocal numbers are horrendous, especially the screeching opening credit song by America, featuring a bad 80s drum machine/synth track. If you want a better early Steve Martin film, pick either the one BEFORE this ("Man with two Brains") or the one AFTER ("All of Me"), both of which are much better suited to his personality.
The script doesn't play to Martin's strengths (wacky physical humor or surrealistic verbal humor), so he's playing a role that any bland actor - picture someone like Tony Roberts - could have done almost as well. Charles Grodin is merely an annoyance as the one-dimensional geeky lonely guy, and the main female characters are also static and uninteresting.
Even Jerry Goldsmith, who has beefed up many a marginal movie with a good score, goes vanilla here and gives us a bunch of goopy 80s cues, sounding like Dave Grusin on Prozac. The vocal numbers are horrendous, especially the screeching opening credit song by America, featuring a bad 80s drum machine/synth track. If you want a better early Steve Martin film, pick either the one BEFORE this ("Man with two Brains") or the one AFTER ("All of Me"), both of which are much better suited to his personality.