The only explanation for April's Shower, Trish Doolan's debut feature, is that it's a kids' picture: a silly little after-school special made by a Disney wanna-be to present a sugarcoated love story about—gulp—lesbians to youngsters who have never heard of such a thing. That would make sense, if only kids today weren't too sophisticated for such a movie.
As a film geared toward actual adults, however, there's really no excuse for April's Shower at all. It's an unwatchable embarrassment of atrocious writing, bad acting and cringe-inducing archetypal characters—from the limp-wristed silly faggot to the crazy therapist and the hot Latina lover. They've all gathered for the bridal shower of their friend April (Cina), who no one has ever figured out is the closeted ex-lover of Alex (Doolan), even though Alex, who is hosting the shower, stomps around and sighs with jealousy and resentment. Absurd situations abound, like April's Catholic mother going from nasty homophobe to lesbian matchmaker in about two hours.
Clearly, the filmmaker thinks her audience is as dim-witted as the characters, as the device employed to foreshadow and set moods is (and here comes the big nod to Disney) the use of little flute riffs, which follow supposedly meaningful lines of script to prompt responses that range in meaning from "Uh-oh" to "Funny!" Here's one they left out: "Uncle!" (Opens Fri; Quad.)—Beth Greenfield