The last gasps of the Summer movie season are increasing with the arrival of August. However, the box office is booming thanks to a hero in red and blue tights. After his phenomenal and record-breaking ticket power last weekend, Spidey can’t swing through every auditorium in the multiplex. Mind you, that epic ancient adventure is also hanging in, but there’s got to be space for a little romance, and, as they sang in the 1920’s, “makin’ whoopee”. There’s plenty of both in this weekend’s release of a “rom-com” with a futuristic satiric “twist”. So what if the “single-set” could only mix it up on one day? It’s a long evening, actually, as we follow the madcap travails of a duo over ONE NIGHT ONLY.
The story actually begins a couple of hours earlier. The opening prologue text gives us the setting. It is the not-so-distant future in the much more “straight-laced” USA. Three years previous, the feds have instituted “The Mandate”. This is a sweeping “law of the land” that prohibits the unmarried from engaging in all sexual activity except for one night, this very day, from 7 PM to 7 AM. And… they have to use “protection”. Everyone now is marked with a small tattoo (a bat, a lighthouse, etc.) on their wrist that changes from red to green, for “go at it”. We first meet “session ” singer Allie (Monica Barbaro) as she finishes up a commercial “jingle” gig prior to meeting up with her gal pal to meet a nice nighttime “hook-up”. Well, Jacinta (King Princess) hooks up early, so Allie trudges back to the NYC apartment she shares with Arja (Quintessa Swindell). She’s babysitting for some buddies, so she loans her most sparkly, revealing party dress to Allie. Meanwhile, pizza shop owner Owen (Callum Turner) is bringing in the married “night shift” so he can thoroughly “enjoy” the night with his longtime girlfriend Malika (Maya Hawke). Their early fancy dinner doesn’t go as planned when she drops a “bombshell”. She wants to spend the night with someone else, their neighbor, saying that being with others will “strengthen” their bond (um…yeah). So he can’t return to their building. He embarks on a frantic search that appears successful with a sultry bartender, until it seems that no condoms are to be had anywhere. Eventually he has a “meet gross” with Allie, and they soon end up vying for the city’s last bit of latex. That’s just the start of their odyssey through the wee hours as they continue to cross paths. Could the universe be telling them something, or is it just bad, dumb luck? And the clock clicks down to dawn…
The biggest casting surprise here may be the versatile and very photogenic Ms. Barbaro, who was a superb Joan Baez in the Dylan biopic a couple of years ago. Happily, we get another treat from her polished “pipes” in two sequences. She combines those skills with a deft comic touch while still giving Allie a determined “edge” and an endearing charm, even as she nearly pops out of that teeny-tiny “almost” dress. Of course, it helps that she has formidable chemistry with the affable Turner, who is given better material than in his last foray into fantasy rom-coms in last year’s ETERNITY. He immediately has us rooting for Owen as his plans for romance blow up in his face when he is “blindsided” by his “bae” (Ms. Hawke continues to impress, even with this most unsympathetic character). Turner tempers his “action hero” physique with a snarky “wiseguy” everyman vibe. But this dynamic duo doesn’t provide all the laughs, as the flick is peppered with comic vets and newcomers. Owen’s no-filter mother is the iconic Molly Ringwald, who is paired with another 1980s fave, LeVar Burton, as her frisky paramour. Yes, there are lots of “hey, that’s…” moments that I’ll refrain from spoiling, but I’ll single out two big “scene-stealers”. As Allie’s pop music superstar “dream”, Ezra Stone, Charlie Gillespie composes a memorably awkward “love song” (this horny dimwit wants you to remember, it’s not a duet), while Mateo Ray charms as Arja’s ‘charge” Troy, who so wants to be a “playa'” during this long wild evening.
Helming this carnal chaos is movie comedy vet Will Gluck, who last gave us the silly star-fueled rom-com ANYONE BUT YOU (a big surprise hit), though I’m more of a fan of EASY A (and he inexplicably made the 2014 ANNIE and the PETER RABBIT kid-flicks). He keeps the pace flowing as he emulates AFTER HOURS (boy, that movie is so influential), occasionally pulling on the heartstrings just before a nice bit of slapstick (gotta’ get that “glove”). Now, he doesn’t “soft pedal” the political satire in this, as “The Mandate” is mocked in several TV news segments. Perhaps this is the “hook” that put this script from Travis Braun on the 2024 screenplay “Black List”, though it might just have been the concept of a sex-mad riff on THE PURGE (more filthy fun and a lot less gore). Sure, we are hoping that Allie and Owen finally “hook up”, but this trip has lots of unexpected detours and side tracks, with a final stop that doesn’t feel contrived. Even though it’s hard to fathom that these two cross paths in the Big Apple (the location work is stellar, making the city as much a character as with Spidey) so often in this twelve-hour fornicating frenzy. Certainly, its 100-plus minutes needed a good trimming (ten off the “top”), but those filmgoers into some really raunchy R-rated (a deserving rating) ribaldry should find plenty during this ONE NIGHT ONLY.
3 Out of 4
ONE NIGHT ONLY is now playing exclusively in theatres
