Meanwhile, another friend, Izzy (Michael Weston), is still miserably stuck on the long-time girlfriend who dumped him, while Kenny (Eric Christian Olsen), the heedless stud of the bunch, finds sexual fulfillment — strenuous but meaningless — with a woman he picked up at the same wedding at which Michael met Kim.
Goldwyn arranges these subplots in a jostling, restless counterpoint so that The Last Kiss sometimes feels like an entire season of a television series crammed into less than two hours, full of activity, but lacking shape. Michael's emotional predicament also unfolds alongside a crisis in the marriage of Jenna's parents, as her mother (Blythe Danner) tires of her cold, sarcastic mate (Mr. Wilkinson) and tries vainly to reconnect with an old flame (Harold Ramis).
None of these developments — or a conveniently timed death in Izzy's family — is given the dramatic room it requires, and after a while the movie starts to feel thin and threadbare. Barrett is a glowing, lovely presence, but her character exists in the penumbra of Michael's narcissism, and the filmmakers seem not to have much interest in her beyond her almost symbolic function as the embodiment of domesticity and incipient motherhood. We never learn the subject of her dissertation, and we also don't understand what she sees in Michael.
Braff's panicky passivity is its own kind of magnetism, I guess. His wobbly chin and startled eyes might be taken for evidence of sweetness, and he is certainly a credible incarnation of the kind of mopey, wet-noodle hipster lately ubiquitous in independent movies, unsigned rock bands and certain Brooklyn neighborhoods. But the challenge of conveying both Michael's weakness and his decency — the qualities that lead him astray and those that make him worthy of forgiveness — seems entirely beyond him.
Barrett, by contrast, seems to be playing a grown woman, which makes her a more sympathetic character and also, given the film's skewed allegiances, a less interesting one. Jenna's role is to save Michael from his worst impulses, and Barrett very nearly saves The Last Kiss as well by giving full voice to the rage, hurt and humiliation that follow Michael's betrayal. In the end, though, you can't shake the feeling that Michael deserved worse, and she deserved better — than him, and than this earnest, confused movie.
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