Sol Goode

With a massive cast of B-listers, Sol Goode is little more than an exercise in the strangeness of 20-something life in Hollywood. Even then, it’s not a risqué introspective on filmstar’s kids, but a shallow American Pie-style try-hard with slightly older protagonists.

Sol Goode (Balthazar Getty) is a shallow loser adrift in his twenties. Borrowing money from his parents and living on Social Security, he constantly tries his hand at being an actor but fails to land any sort of part. Meanwhile, his best friend Chloe, a militant waitress, is trying to get on with her life, although it is apparent she has a thing for Sol. Sol however, somehow talking his way into thousands of young ladies’ bedrooms, thinks of little else but himself.

"I’ve got such a bangover…"

With his posse of like-minded friends, Sol drifts through life moderately uncomfortably. When his Texan cousin comes to stay and seems to be starting a relationship with Chloe, Sol realises that he’s tired of the shallow life and is secretly in love with her. So he sets about straightening out his life in order to win her over.

So, it’s obviously not a new idea. However, this rather hackneyed theme hasn’t been done in this environment all that often. But that doesn’t mean it’s been done all that well either. It has its moments of laughs, but these don’t come all that frequently and not in the same style as the American Pie films. Those films had characters you either really, really liked or really, really disliked whereas this filmful of whiners are not unlikeable, but just lack any real depth.

Writer/director (and participant actor) Danny Comden does know funny, that’s apparent, but perhaps he is held back by the stable of youthful stars who would obviously be friends of his. Maybe not, I dunno, but there seems a distinct lack of humour in any of the characters while not having a great deal of emotional discomfort to make them any deeper in that regard. This all combines to create a rather pedestrian affair of little worth. The laughs are too sporadic and the plot too clichéd to give us any surprise value. This is a good one to check out via rental before deciding to fork over your dineros.

The picture quality here is just fine. There are no major glitches I could pick up and no real film artefacts. The widescreen 1.85:1 with 16:9 enhancement looks fine and while not really challenging any cinematographic conventions, is suitable for the vehicle it is employed upon.

Troubles begin here, however. Delivered in Dolby Digital 5.1 surround, there are certain dialogue troubles regarding synching. There is but one certainly distinct moment where Chloe is speaking in which the audio track is a good heartbeat behind the visuals. I couldn’t find this elsewhere, but this shouldn’t really occur to begin with. However, all is spoken clearly enough.

Music by David Jordan is fine for the purposes here and is well balanced with tracks from various indie and poignant (read: fashionable) bands of today. While well put together, it’s still not a soundtrack that has me racing to the store. Sound effects are fine; occasionally comical and unrealistic but funny, and all sound even enough.

A simple trailer is all we get from the static menu. What’s weird is there’s a cheerleader character flouting her big ol' bosom on the menu, although she doesn’t appear anywhere in the film. I can only assume it’s Tori Spelling making the most of her reconstructive work (it's the same as the cover art up there.)

Sol Goode is one of those films you’ll forget you saw about two days afterward. Then, a year or two from now, someone will have it on their TV when you visit, or it will spring up one late Sunday evening when you’re mildly intoxicated and you’ll stare at it for half an hour before finally stating to yourself, ‘I’ve seen this’ or remarking to a partner, ‘have we seen this?’. In either regard, you’ll just grab the remote and flip channels before settling back on it, but even then, the break while channel surfing was too much to keep you interested and you’ll turn off the TV and go to bed. Or actually have a conversation with the friend you were visiting.

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