As pickup lines go, “Wanna check out the Hieronymus Bosch exhibit?” is a pretty telling one, and it sets the scene for Adam Sherman’s bleak portrait of Zach (Lukas Haas), an alcoholic, divorced young man slurping and sleeping his way through Los Angeles. But hellish as his city is, there’s no colorful Boschian absurdism here, only soulless banter and projectile vomit.
Aided by his bartender friend (Jake Busey), Zach pursues the troubled 20-something girl he calls Crazy Eyes (Madeline Zima) while fending off the inexplicable attentions of several other women and actively resisting any sort of personal growth.
Unpleasant as it is, you can’t exactly call Sherman’s perspective misogynistic, if only because the protagonist hates himself every bit as much.