Not Another Happy Ending

Why do so many rom-coms rely on preposterous premises? When they work (rarely, such as in Sliding Doors) the overall feel of the film can overcome its shortcomings. In this case, without it's female lead it would be pretty much unwatchable. I liked the idea of Jane's protagonist, Darcie, dogging her during the writer's block, but this was too underplayed and could have provided a lot more comedy than it did. The male lead character lacks all credibility and Stanley Weber's performance is mind-numbing. Otherwise, the supporting characters are badly drawn and barely justify their screen time. In particular the male support to Weber, supposedly a secondary school teacher is laughable, in all the wrong ways (how did he manage to get hold of a taxi?), while Jane's sleazeball, mistaken love interest (Willie) is stereotyping at it's worst. Karen Gillan carries the film on her own, and it's worth watching just for her performance. In the end the overall feeling is that there was a much better film trying to get out. Continuity and editing weren't much good either, but nice locations. Curiosity point: interesting to see non-sexualized nudity actually justified by the plot.