Must Love Dogs is guilty of many things, the least of which is purporting to be a romantic comedy. It’s neither romantic nor funny; what it is, though, is so stunningly bad that when the film reaches its few points of absolute mediocrity, it’s an achievement worth noting.

rated PG-13

Must Love Dogs is guilty of many things, the least of which is purporting to be a romantic comedy. It’s neither romantic nor funny; what it is, though, is so stunningly bad that when the film reaches its few points of absolute mediocrity, it’s an achievement worth noting.

Like the oft-misleading Internet personal ads it tries to parody, Must Love Dogs looks good on the surface. At least, it should look good. Diane Lane and John Cusack are likeable stars, and they’ve got a great supporting cast, including Stockard Channing and Christopher Plummer, backing them up. Besides, romantic comedies are at the very least harmless and, at best, mildly amusing. Plus, there are dogs, and who doesn’t love dogs?

Unfortunately, even the opening credits, during which anonymous singles list what they look for in a mate, are incredibly annoying and the movie only goes downhill from there. Viewers are forced to slog through the ordinary lives of newly divorced schoolteacher Sarah (Lane) and amateur boat builder Jake (Cusack). Sarah’s family, a large Irish clan with Plummer as the patriarch, needles Sarah about her post-divorce dating life. In short, she doesn’t have one, and her sister decides to put Sarah on an Internet dating site. Across town, a similarly meddling friend does the same thing to Jake, who, following his divorce, endlessly watches Doctor Zhivago and wears the same Ramones T-shirt every day. The characters are all so flat and uninteresting that director/screenwriter Gary David Goldberg doesn’t even bother to give them last names, let alone any sort of history or, you know, good dialogue. 

Jake and Sarah eventually meet in a dog park, each co-opting someone else’s dog in order to facilitate the meeting. The dog park meeting exposes the film for the pack of lies that it is. Must love dogs? Hah! Neither character even owns a dog, never mind loves them. Despite this, and many other egregious lies, Jake and Sarah kinda-sorta fall for each other, almost have sex and endure a series of needless complications before they wind up together during the literal last minute of the film.

With such a great cast, it seems impossible for Must to have turned out so badly. The blame belongs to Goldberg, a veteran sitcom writer, for forcing upon viewers something so bland and shrill. Jake, Sarah and company are all one-note characters, and they keep playing that note so loudly that it pounds into your brain like an iron spike. Even incidental characters, like the deli manager who tries to offer Sarah dating advice, are played with such over-the-top, sitcom-style outrageousness that it’s hard not to wince.

Watching the film is so much like a bad first date that every time a joke falls flat or Cusack says something in that nervous, doofy hipster style he’s used to keep his career afloat for the last few years, you’ll be tempted to sneak off into the bathroom and climb out a window. But you’ll stay, not because you paid eight bucks to get in, but out of a sense of pity.