THE BALTIMORONS (A-minus) - Michael Strassner co-writes and co-stars as an out-of-work comedian experiencing, essentially, one long 24-hour meet-cute with an older woman.
Strassner, a Baltimore native, teamed up on the script with Jay Duplass, who directs here like a man smitten with the city, exploring its municipal beauty and its working-class neighborhoods. He follows Strassner as Cliff, who accidentally knocks out a tooth on Christmas Eve and must leave his fiance and her family for emergency intervention by an older dentist named Didi (Liz Larsen), whom he falls for.
Didi, old enough to be Cliff's mother, is charmed by the big goof and flattered on a day when she found out that her ex has married a younger woman. Strassner and Larsen thus dominate the movie with their overnight urban adventure that includes an urgent search for soft-shelled crabs.
Cliff is a controlled mess. In the opening scene, we see a comically unsuccessful suicide attempt. He is six months sober and still reeling from being kicked out of his improv group for criticizing a fellow member, though his best pal in the collective is begging him to return to perform his popular Baltimorons routine. It's not spelled out at first, but Cliff's relationship is on shaky ground as well.
Cliff and Didi are constantly coming to the rescue of the other. Even after the tooth gets a temporary fix, Cliff's car gets towed, and later Didi will get pulled over by a traffic cop. In between, they go to her ex's house, where Cliff helps ease the social awkwardness that involves not only the new wife (Mary Catherine Garrison from HBO's "Somebody Somewhere") but Didi's grown daughter and granddaughter. (The ex will be one of two grievance-addled middle-aged white men who get lightly singed with one-liners.)
Strassner is a natural comedian and Larsen (a journeyman with 17 "Law & Order" TV credits) has an Ellen Barkin buzz about her. This is in many ways a traditional romantic comedy, albeit with gloomy undertones. The Christmas milieu is more menacing than mirthful, and Duplass thankfully does not overdo the holiday shtick (he relies on muted decorations and inoffensive jazzy renditions of a few yule classics). The director -- continuing an older-woman fetishization we saw between him and Edie Falco in 2018's "Outside In") -- keeps the momentum going for 100 lively minutes.
A viewer will have to tolerate Cliff's goofy demeanor for that length of time, as well as Didi's bashful parrying of Cliff's come-ons, but there is substance here to each character's personal growth that gets unpacked from their heavy baggage in a short time span. (For him, sobriety provides some clarity; for her, a few drinks loosen things up.) It's an impressive debut for Strassner and a welcome big-screen platform for his co-star. Score another one for the Duplass film factory.
BONUS TRACK
A tender moment between Cliff and Didi is choreographed to the Gershwin tune "Someone to Watch Over Me," by Jordan Seigel and Lia Booth:
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