Roger Dodger

Recent times have seen a proliferation of verbose, middle-class comedies with New York settings (Igby Goes Down, The Royal Tenenbaums, Tadpole) celebrating the city’s native wit, and its inhabitants’ infinite capacity for sneering, affected world-weariness.
Roger Dodger is the latest such offering and it’s really rather good. Our titular hero is Roger (Scott), an obnoxious advertising copywriter and ageing lothario given to launching into well-rehearsed party-piece diatribes on the war of the sexes. Just as he gets the elbow from his lover/boss (Rossellini), his sixteen year old nephew Nick (Eisenberg) shows up unexpectedly. Like most lads his age, he’s wide-eyed, inquisitive and desperate for the faintest possibility of pussy, so he looks to his uncle for help with his non-existant seduction techniques. Roger duly obliges and drags the boy around town to chase skirt, targeting Beals and Berkley at first, then slinking off into an increasingly sordid night.
It soon transpires that Roger isn’t the confident chick-magnet Nick supposed. When he isn’t on a self-destructive buzz to rival a lemming on a kamikaze tour-of-duty, he still only inspires a mixture of contempt, pity and amusement from his would-be female prey.

This may sound very Neal La Bute, but debutant writer/director Dylan Kidd takes considerably less pleasure in his creation’s misogynistic tendencies, and instead focuses on his frailty. In doing so he fashions an exquisitely considered piece on male sexuality and merciless gender battles. Of course, the cause is helped massively by great performances. Cameo roles from Beals and Rossellini may be fleeting, but they establish a crucial sense of female strength and the impeturbability of a Buddhist monk on Churchill-sized doses of tranquillizers. Hell, even Berkeley doesn’t disgrace herself. What were the odds?
The real stars of the show however are the boys; newcomer Eisenberg radiates nervous, awkward charm, while Scott is magnificent. Having spent years as the ‘everyman’ in films like The Spanish Prisoner, he’s finally demonstrating some of his father’s august presence and versatility in a memorable role which arouses loathing and compassion in equal measure.
If then, you’re seeking something with a bit more bite than the mindless ‘pleasures’ of summer cinema, Rog’s your uncle.