The brilliant thing about Debra Markowitz’s Wait List: A Love-ish Story is that it is both a fun and sexy, Notting Hill sort of “what if” romance, balanced with the serious and sad sort of In the Bedroom weighty shift that lands this accomplished indie dramedy somewhere similar to Mike Nichols territory.
Bec Fordyce and Travis Grant are Carter Morgan and Lisa Chase. Carter and Lisa have always been close. From their earliest encounters, Carter sought opportunities to talk with, hang out near, and even watch in secret, this woman of his dreams. So, one day, when Lisa needs help to fix her computer, she asks him for help. Then Carter makes his move. It pays off, and soon he and Lisa are tumbling in the sheets.
The entrance of Lisa’s son interrupts their lovemaking, who, upon seeing that her bedfellow is his buddy from school, knocks Carter out and leaves. That’s right, folks. Stella got her groove back by having a fling with a hot young guy, but there’s more here on the cards for Carter and Lisa. For the bond that emerges is tender, something that is like a fire that has seemed to be out, yet merely sleeps beneath the cinders.
But it’s awkward. It’s somebody’s son sleeping with the friend’s mom, and American Pie isn’t real life. People are quick to judge and make assumptions. Plus, there is this verbal and psychological space that our lovers must frequently wade through in dealing with the baggage of who they are, as well as the internal struggles, doubt, fear, and insecurity that occur when they choose to defy social norms.
“Then Carter makes his move. It pays off, and soon he and Lisa are tumbling in the sheets.”
Everything around them seems to conspire to pull Lisa and Carter apart, when all they want to be is together, no matter the outcome. But life lessons come at a heavy price, and the transition from ephemeral dreams to reality, from a youthful idealized fantasy into the mess grounded consequences of an unconventional relationship. Still, because it’s more than sex, and purer than make-believe, Lisa and Carter, though fighting chaos, start finding themselves, and what they truly want. And who?
Markowitz’s script bears hallmarks of Nichols’ work, using sharp, witty, and painful dialogue to reveal character flaws. It also captures that feeling of being an outsider in your own living room, the tension that Carter was a fixture in Lisa’s house as her son’s friend, only to re-enter her life now as her lover, pummeling this rather innocent attraction born out of two people who really need each other, and not just the scandal surrounding the age gap.
Wait List: A Love-ish Story reminds this reviewer, again, of the once-rich pool films of this kind that we could draw from. With a wonderfully evolving plot that keeps you guessing, to the power of the chemistry between Fordyce and Grant, an appearance by the always on-his-game Lukas Hassel as Gregg, a rival for Lisa’s affection, and the director’s polished delivery of a picture that’s not quite a romance and not quite a tragedy, but about the most interesting part, the story in between.
"…not quite a romance and not quite a tragedy..."
