The latest entry in the girl-raunch ranks is “For a Good Time, Call . . . ,” a fantasy about a world in which a telephone fits comfortably against your head and people dial rather than click for titillation. (That place might also be called “the ’80s,” though this film appears to be set in the present day.)
Thrown together by the brutal world of Manhattan real estate, 20-something roommates Lauren (Lauren Miller, also the film’s co-writer) and Katie (Ari Graynor) are not fast friends; rather, they are lingering enemies, dating back to a party four years earlier, at which Katie accidentally splashed a cup of pee into Lauren’s face.
Reunited by Justin Long, chewing the scenery to an irritating extent as Jesse, the Gay Best Friend, they quickly fall into odd-couple shtick.
Katie’s the loud, freewheeling one (I swear Graynor is morphing into a mini-Bette Midler). Lauren’s the type-A fussbudget, obsessing over her hunt for a job in publishing, angling for approval from her parents (Mimi Rogers and Don McManus) and analyzing her recent breakup from clearly awful boyfriend Charlie (James Wolk). “It’s not so bad being alone,” Katie tells her, and you get the feeling it actually might be the first time Lauren’s heard those words.
When Lauren overhears Katie getting some action one night — but fails to see another soul ever materialize in the apartment — she works out Katie’s secret career: phone-sex operator! As job offers aren’t rolling in for Lauren, she reluctantly comes onboard to help Katie launch her own line: 1-800-MMM-HMMM.
Cut to a series of amusing cameos from Kevin Smith, the film director, Ken Marino (“Childrens Hospital”) and Seth Rogen (Miller’s real-life husband) as clients on the other end of the line. Lauren quickly scales the learning curve via Katie’s careful instruction: “Whatever they say, I tell them I want to lick it.” (There’s something to be said for a movie that addresses how adept women can be at “phoning it in.”)
And while the pair rake in the bucks for stringing together random combinations of dirty words, they’re also falling hard — if platonically — for each other.
It’s a refreshing twist on the mainstream love story, which makes it all the more unfortunate that the film’s so beholden to all the same old beats: an inevitable left-field event that will split them up, a tearful reunion that involves running (though the dialogue during this scene is, admittedly, pretty funny). There’s also an 11th-hour secret revealed by the brassy, smut-slinging Katie that strains credibility (and that’s after we’re asked to believe these two can afford a palatial Gramercy apartment).
Still, short-film director Jamie Travis, making his feature debut, gets very likable performances out of his female stars. And it’s nice to see sex given its due as a wide, wild buffet rather than the standard missionary, bra-on fare we’re usually served in a rom-com. Mmm-hmmm!