About Adam

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

(Herald rating: * * )

The suspicion is that this one was kept in the basket marked "straight-to-video" until Kate Hudson became a name with Almost Famous. Either that, or she's getting some pretty odd career advice: "What you really need to cap that Oscar nomination, dear, is an Irish sex comedy. It will be just the thing. After all, we want them to know you can do that charming giggle with an accent."

It might have been a smart move if About Adam didn't think it was such a smart movie. Unfortunately it's one forced farce, a film that spends so much energy constructing the elaborately plotted bed-hopping shenanigans of Adam (Townsend) who, after wooing the free-spirited Lucy (Hudson), proceeds to seduce her very different older sisters, that it forgets to make us believe in or care about the characters.

Its comedy also works on the rather dodgy and dated proposition that all seemingly uptight women need is a good seeing-to and they will bloom into fully functioning human beings. And if that's done by a loveable rogue with a sad background, that's all right. Especially as we're in Dublin, so you get a fair dose of whimsy to take the edge off the sexual politics.

Except, this feels like a backlot version of the Irish capital and it takes an even further leap of faith to believe that American Hudson, Australian Frances O'Connor (as "repressed academic" Laura) and Charlotte Bradley (as "unhappy housewife" Alice) are sisters.

Even more irksome is the character of Adam, who manipulates the siblings by seemingly becoming the man of their dreams with a few minutes of conversation but leaves us without a clue as to the motivation for his charm offensive. And, as an actor, Townsend just doesn't seem the man for the job either.

All of which makes this an Irish sex comedy that's not particularly sexy, comedic or Irish.

Cast: Stuart Townsend, Kate Hudson, Frances O'Connor, Charlotte Bradley

Director: Gerard Stembridge

Rating: M (sex scenes, offensive language)

Running time: 105 mins

Screening: Village Force Queen St, Rialto