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With Irish comedies The Commitments, The Snapper and The Van, author Roddy Doyle's film pedigree is assured. He went against type with a serious period novel, A Star Called Henry, but changed pace with a screenplay "that didn't involve a lot of research". The result is a drab romantic comedy that even lacks the imagination to come up with its own title.

It's hard to warm to Dublin teacher Brendan (Peter McDonald) - movie buff, church choir baritone, lonely bachelor - or feisty blonde Trudy (Flora Montgomery). If opposites attract, physics and movie conventions demand personal magnetism - but as a love story, this just doesn't ring true.

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