Cady's Take:

Young, monogamous couple Ed and Alice (Jay Mohr and Julianne Nicholson) have decided to finally tie the knot after five years. But Alice believes that she hasn’t had enough meaningless sex and that a few anonymous flings will make her a better lover. Ed reluctantly consents, thinking that she’ll never have the guts to go through with it. By the way, he in turn can have as many flings as he wants also. It’s a recipe for disaster, of course, but even as things spiral rather sitcomishly out of control, there's a thread of honesty and reality running through it all.

Ed’s friends, Lou (Josh Charles) and Carl (Andy Richter), have opposite reactions. Smug bachelor Lou sees it as a godsend while good-natured Carl sees it as a disaster waiting to happen. Alice’s sister, Claire (Lauren Graham) who is already stuck in a passionless marriage to her self-absorbed husband likes the whole idea.

Most noteworthy is the performance of Nicholson. A charming, sweet-natured actress with a face that puts every emotion on center stage. She is especially winning in the film's early scenes, when she gets all revved up telling Mohr about her indiscretions. There are some genuine laughs here.

Throw in a couple of odd musician cameos- Jonathan Davis of Korn (as a drug dealer) and Liz Phair (as an aerobics instructor) and we have a decent rental. Nothing to write home about, but an amusing flick.

I liked “Seeing Other People” well enough. It is not an offensive movie, and the premise is interesting enough – before getting married an inexperienced woman (Julianne Nicholson) proposes that she and her fiancée (Jay Mohr) have meaningless sex with others to “get it out of their systems” and prepare them for a lifetime of monogamy.

This movie works sometimes, and it does not work at others. When Alice and Ed are discussing how their little experiment will work, so does the movie. When they are alone together after the experiment begins, it works there too. However Alice – who instigated the project – begins to simply have another relationship, instead of sleeping around like she’d planned, that does not work and only serves to overly-complicate the plot in what I feel is an unnecessary way.

I liked the cast of supporting characters very much: Lauren Graham, who I am not usually particularly fond of, plays Alice’s socially awkward and cynical sister Claire. Claire is married to the drunk and lonely Peter (Bryan Cranston) who is hilarious, if not completely fleshed out as a character. Plenty of other favorites appear as well – Josh Charles (Sports Night) as Ed’s agent and Andy Richter as their unemployed and good-hearted friend Carl. Carl has a great sub-plot involving his relationship with a woman (Helen Slater) and her child, and I really liked Carl’s approach at step-parenting.

While there is nothing objectionable about “Seeing Other People” it is not a film I would be compelled to watch again. It’s disappointing the way the film approaches truths about love, relationships, and sex over and over but never manages to reveal much of anything.