So the two Black Swan girls are now trying to out-do each other in nearly identical Generation-Y comedies. First Natalie Portman teams with Ashton Kutcher in No Strings Attached, and now Mila Kunis teams with Timberlake in Friends with Benefits. Who’s getting the better of this war? Well considering that we shut off No Strings Attached about half way through, wondering why we even lasted that long, and we made it all the way through Friends with Benefits (wincing a bit,) I guess Mila wins. But the real reason she wins is that is she can pull of this kind of role and Natalie Portman definitely cannot – in fact, it boggles my mind why Natalie Portman is driving headlong for this image as a Gen-Y sex kitten. I can’t think of a less suitable match for her. She is, and always will be, that amazing and bizarre kid in Beautiful Girls. Mila, on the other hand, gets that callow, neurotic, emotionally-vapid Gen-Y chick thing perfectly. Plus she is very warm on-screen, has a pretty good voice, and is a fairly decent actress – all clear advantages over the now-vaunted Ms. Portman.

Friends with Benefits shows the frightening reality of Generation-Y love. It might have attempted to be cute if it wasn’t so damn cold and robotic in spirit. I found myself wondering “what the fuck is wrong with these people?” Even when they fall in love, they don’t really fall in love. The “friendly” sex quickly crosses a line from cute to gross and repulsive. When she sucks him off into her mouth and then comes up for air, she kind of reminded me of the sex replicants in Blade Runner (not a good image!) And I find it really fascinating the way they put Generation-Y pop music at the forefront all through the film, because it gives us a chance to ponder how bad popular music became in the 90’s. The decay didn’t start with all this autotuned shit we have now. It pretty much started in 1993. I mean, who could respond emotionally to any of that music in the movie – basically, all any of it is worth is an ironic smirk or maybe a self-conscious chuckle. I consider this a huge problem. Eroticism started to die in pop music sometime during the 1990’s because this is when it started to die in our society. How can you have a romantic comedy when there is no substantive notion of “romance” anymore. Let’s hope they keep making 1980’s romantic comedies, to move us and give the younger generations something to dream about.

The film’s script is in a lot of ways a bizarre mess. They introduced too many competing storylines, and then in its final third the film loses all focus and never comes back together (despite some serious desperation toward this end during the film’s finale.) The film is also distractingly incongruous. Kunis is supposed to be an executive recruiter – she looks and acts nothing like an executive recruiter. Timberlake is supposed to be a big-shot artistic director – he looks and acts nothing like a big shot artistic director. She looks like she works at a Starbucks and he looks like an out-of-work actor waiting tables at the NoHo Star. And nobody, I mean nobody commutes to work by antique motor boat from New Jersey, and ties their boat up to the public pier parks along the Hudson.

As far as the whole “flash mob” thing goes, all I can say is that I’ve lived in New York for 16 years and not once have I ever seen a flash mob, or heard of a specific occurrence of one. I’m not saying they don’t occur. I’m merely suggesting that people not weigh the “flash mob phenomenon” too heavily in their deliberations as to whether or not to move here (as Timberlake does in this film.)

As for Mr. Timberlake, I think the bottom line is that he is just a bad actor, period. He’s all guns and abs (his guns are positively frightening, as is his neck.) But in addition he is a really visually unpleasant guy, especially when he takes his shirt off. He looks like a slab of bacon (uncooked.) And he has extremely unattractive hair, questionable skin, and a whiny, unappealing voice. I don’t know who decided this dude was the next leading man, but good heavens! Between him and Ashton Kutcher, we’re all doomed.

Friends with Benefits: it’s a pretty dreary affair, really.