Flannel Pajamas

A man and woman meet. They hit it off and begin dating. They discover one another, first discovering one another's personality, and in time discovering each other sexually. They marry. The day to day of married life is much tougher than the glow and excitement of courtship. Just as they fell in love, they can also fall out of love.

Flannel Pajamas is the story of Stewart and Nicole as they find each other, grow together and then grow apart. The story has a gritty reality of how hard relationships can be to maintain. This is an at times painfully intimate look at real relationships. That reality comes from Writer-Director Jeff Lipsky's reminiscence of a failed marriage -- the good times and the bad.

Those who think they can survive of the romantic rush of early love will most certainly be disappointed and hurt. Love needs to continue to grow in ever new ways to survive. In Flannel Pajamas, the nurture for that growth is totally absent.

It doesn't take long to realize that this match is doomed. My first reaction to Stewart as he tries to impress Nicole on their blind date was, “This guy is full of shit.� Basically that was what he did for a living; he was a bullshit artist who spun stories about Broadway shows to get groups to buy tickets. That was how he approached everything in life -- exaggerate or just plain make things up to get what you want.

It's not that we think he's a bad guy -- on the contrary, he is extremely generous and giving in many ways. But we also discover little by little that he is controlling and can be cruel, even in his tenderness.

Nicole's flaws are not as evident, but she too is less than perfect. She's a bit of a slacker without ambition. She's willing to hide the truth when it seems convenient. She has baggage that she's not willing to part with.

These two were set up on their blind date by their therapist. Neither bothered to ask what led the other to therapy until they're having their first sexual encounter, and then they never answer the question. Both come from families built around unhappy marriages.

The little bits of insight that come up in the courtship stage are easy to put aside, but when the day to day reality of living together accentuates these issues, it becomes more than the relationship can handle, and they begin to grow apart and even to detest each other.

Although the film shows an important reality about life, it is a very cynical view of that reality. Cynicism in itself is not a bad thing. Cynics question everything -- especially the way life is to be lived. Many consider the biblical book Ecclesiastes to be the work of a cynic. But the cynicism in this film is a dark, unredeemed cynicism. It is cynicism without hope. It is cynicism without wisdom.

While a cynical look at this relationship could have been an opportunity to teach us something about how to live with another, instead it gives the impression that all such relationships are doomed. There are no good marriages in this film, only marriages that have ended, that have been built on lies, or that are going nowhere. There is no one in this film who seems to believe that marriage can be a good thing. Nicole's friend Tess, who collects ex-lovers and ex-husbands, has a brief speech in which she talks about the certainty of relationships turning sour and the need to be ready to move on to the next.

Besides its cynicism about marriage and relationships, this is a film that is very cynical about Christianity. There are various places where Christianity is portrayed in a negative light, but nowhere in a positive light. Nicole's mother tells Stewart (who is Jewish) that she believes every negative stereotype about Jews. Tess, who goes from one sexual partner to another, is always wearing a conspicuous cross. When Nicole's sister Tara finds Nicole praying, Tara tells her that religion was a crutch she gave up when she became a parent and had to be responsible.

Certainly there is ample room to be cynical about Christianity. There are Christians like all of these -- and some who are even worse. But it cannot be dismissed so easily as a way that many people find strength in difficult times or as a way to live that can be an important component of a full life.

While the film shows how easy it is to let something as precious as a loving relationship slip away because we do not nourish it daily, in the end, the cynicism overwhelms whatever wisdom we might hope to find.