Roger Dodger

Director: Dylan Kidd
Year Released: 2002
Rating: 2.5

Smarmy, loquacious Roger (a too-good-to-be-true Campbell Scott) imparts wisdom on women to his too-naïve-to-be-true nephew and takes him on a I Pass Like Nightesque tour through New York's seedy underbelly; as it turns out, the ladies prefer innocent and shy to worldly and aggressive. Scott's confidence and Kidd's delirious (almost drunken) camera are the best things in this picture - which feels like it was left-over from the ultimate era of young people engaging in sexual conversation, the 90's - and make up for the simplistic logic and weak character study, which turns Roger the West Side Lothario into a more Mature, Self-Reflective Roger by the last half-hour: if you've heard of a hooker with a heart-of-gold, now you've got the emotionally-stunted-misogynist who imparts wisdom on socially inadequate high school kids and (inexplicably) yanks his protégé away from a crude but attractive young hooker he foisted upon him. At least Aaron Eckhart stayed an asshole in In the Company of Men.