Falling in love is easy, but staying in love is where it becomes challenging. It seems to be a dreadfully trite subject, but we’ve seen multiple examples of stories crafted around the trials and tribulations of couples as they find themselves weathering the storm of relationships that steadily decline for one reason or another. For some, its a case of infidelity or a loss of attraction, for others its outright boredom as the spark gradually becomes extinguished, and seems to be incapable of being reignited. This is the topic that inspires Michael Angelo Covino and Kyle Marvin as they develop their second feature-length collaboration in the form of Splitsville, an anti-romantic comedy written by the two lifelong friends and directed by Covino, and tells the story of two men rapidly approaching the other side of middle age, dealing with the realisation that their wives no longer love them as they used to. For Carey, its his wife’s growing boredom at their marriage that has grown stale after just a year, whereas for Paul, it’s a matter of his wife deciding that she simply did not find him particularly exciting. What follows is a series of misadventures as they quartet try and fail to make sense of these enormous changes, especially when it turns out that none of them are entirely ready to move on just yet, which leads to some unexpected consequences for them all. A film that works better in theory than it did in execution, it struggles to do anything even vaguely compelling, being every cliche that surrounds romantic comedies jumbled into a form that is nothing if not totally mangled, both narratively and tonally. Whatever possessed Covino to make certain decisions is truly inexplicable, and while we may be able to see the appeal from a distance, the overall nature of Splitsville is just too overtly unpleasant to ever actually work, being as mean-spirited as it is genuinely poorly developed, lacking any real substance or nuance, or even being able to scrounge up enough enthusiasm to be a valid criticism of the way romance has changed over time, being just a plain failure in terms of both concept and execution.

By this point, if someone wants to make a film about romance, they need to make a decision: either abide by the tried-and-tested techniques that have always driven the genre, or find something that hasn’t been said or done before and build from there. These are essentially the only two methods to succeed in a genre that has become woefully oversaturated as time has progressed, despite the ease that usually comes when telling these stories. Splitsville fails on every front, but even in terms of conception, we can see the clear flaws, since it doesn’t present anything even vaguely new, but still wants to be seen as this subversive, challenging work as opposed to a very clearly one-dimensional attempt at redefining romantic comedies to expose the challenges that come with any kind of long-running relationship. We struggle to find any themes that are particularly resonant throughout this film, since everything is so obvious, plucked straight from over a century of romantic comedies produced in every conceivable medium, while also not being respectful enough to the ones that came before to actually use the foundation they set in any meaningful, compelling way. If there is something we take away from Splitsville, it would be the commentary around the recent move towards popularising the concept of open marriages – not a new concept, but one that has become far more prominent in recent years. It remains a controversial topic. Unfortunately, this film presents itself as being on the wrong side of the debate, since it shows nothing but disdain for those couples who are open enough with each other to pursue polyamorous relationships, making its position clear that it doesn’t believe such a situation works. Whether or not one subscribes to the belief in monogamy as the only feasible form of romantic pursuit, it’s difficult to find any value in what this film is saying – and the fact that it is essentially not saying anything at all somehow only makes it twice as insulting to the viewer, who expects at least some kind of meaningful statement.

Unfortunately, we find that it’s not only the narrative that the film struggles to develop properly, but virtually every other aspect is just as poorly handled. The tone is extremely inconsistent, with the film never being sure if it wants to be this sardonic, bleak dark comedy or something more tender – they’re not mutually exclusive, but the one-dimensional nature of the narrative and the clear fact that no one in this film seems to be willing to push themselves makes it quite clear that there was simply nothing of value being said or done throughout this film. It tends to be very unforgiving to its characters, despite wanting us to form meaningful relationships with all of them, something that never really manifests in any significant or compelling way, instead relishing in putting them all through the wringer in favour of an oddly cruel depiction of contemporary romance. It is filled to the brim with thinly written characters that are extracted directly from the most surface-level introductory text on comedy writing, with not a single person in this film being anything close to nuanced or meaningful, instead existing as bundles of quirks that exist solely to be thrown around by a script that simply does not invest in any of them as characters. It genuinely believes itself to be smarter and more subversive than it actually knew it could be, which is the first sign of a film that truly has very little – if any – respect for its audience, since we’re led into believing that it is going to have a purpose, only to realise that its nothing but a jumble of poorly-assembled ideas masquerading as a satire, not actually being aware of what it was that they were aiming to lampoon, and simply throwing its weight behind the most surface-level, conventional jokes imaginable, never contributing anything to a conversation that is already common to the point of being exhausting. It’s not a good film even when it tries to do something different, which is the first sign that we should not be taking this particularly seriously, as even a basic comedy about romance.

While it is certainly not an immediate indication of vanity, I am often slightly wary of directors who cast themselves in the leading roles of their films, especially when they have not been proven as being particularly strong actors in the past, as well as when the film they are making is built around romance. Covino is not inherently a bad actor, but whoever led him to believe that he could play a romantic lead (even a hopelessly pathetic one) deserves some scrutiny, since there is nothing about him that fits the part of Paul, nor is there much to be said about Marvin as Carey, two characters who are woefully miscast. This isn’t a case of them not looking the part, but rather that they lack the charisma and complexity to play such interesting characters, to the point where it honestly felt like they cast themselves as these deeply mediocre men who just so happen to be married to two of the most beautiful women working in cinema today. Reading between the lines is not always a good idea, but when we realise the extent to which their performances don’t match the content of the film or its underlying message, it’s difficult not to see the vanity on display, particularly since they’re not particularly good at any point in this film. Interestingly, it is the two people who are objectified to the point of bordering on frustrating that prove to be the closest this film has to redeeming qualities – Adria Arjona and Dakota Johnson are by far the only good aspects of the film, solely because they are committed to doing more than just aiming for the low-hanging fruit. Unfortunately, there is only so much that can be done with bland characters that don’t exist for any reason other than playing into the trope of the deeply mediocre man being able to earn a beautiful, successful partner simply because of his disproportionate charm and ability to fool her into falling in love with him. It’s a superficial way to look at the subject, but there is never a point in Splitsville where we are able to give the filmmakers the benefit of the doubt.

More than anything else, the reason Splitsville is a total misfire is simply because it doesn’t have anything to say. We can forgive some tonal imbalances, mediocre performances and the occasional diversion into truly mean-spirited storytelling, but we simply cannot overlook the fact that the film refuses to say anything of value, despite positioning itself as some immensely brilliant critique of modern romance. This is not a good film at all, and while it is not an unreasonable length at 100 minutes, it moves so slowly and with such a jagged, inconsistent pace that it feels twice as long (the editing is extremely poor – some scenes drag, and others that move so rapidly we don’t even glean much information), never achieving anything beyond the bare minimum – if even that is a realistic goal in the first place. I see no reason to put much blind faith in Covino, who is competent at the best of times. His filmmaking is passable, his writing is somewhere between lacklustre and atrocious depending on the scene, and his acting is even more questionable, which is not something that we should be reducing someone working in independent cinema to, but it’s unfortunately the truth, with every aspect of Splitsville being misguided, manhandled and frankly just as frustrating as it is extraordinarily boring. It doesn’t achieve anything of value and is simply a waste of time, both conceptually and formally, failing to do something so basic, which is to be at least mildly entertaining. Splitsville had some good ideas (but then again, none of it was actually strong enough to merit some of these questionable directorial decisions), squandered by someone who allowed their vanity and genuine belief in their ingenuity to get in the way of saying something of consequence, rather than just being the most heavy-handed misfire of the year.