Sundance 2009: Isn't it bromantic?

Imagine, if you will, a Judd Apatow comedy in which settled-down married man Jason Segel hears a knock on his door at 2am. Hey, it's Seth Rogen, his old college buddy who's been living the proto-hippie wandering life and decided to show up unannounced! One night, after a large amount of recreational substances are smoked and spirits are consumed, the two chums make a bet to enter a local amateur-porn contest. Their entry: a short film of the two them screwing…each other. Oh, the uncomfortable, homosexual panic-soaked hilarity!

Humpday, the first competition film to screen at this year's Sundance, doesn't star either of those schlubby sex symbols. (How subversive would that be?) But it shares the exact same full-frontal-dude-ity vibe as the Apatow & Co. oeuvre, repackaged for the lo-fi crowd. The film's premise just takes all those films' latent bromance aspects and lets them bubble up to the surface. Neither Ben (Mark Duplass), the responsible adult, nor Andrew (Joshua Leonard), the wanna-be Jack Kerouac that's decided to stay with his pal indefinitely, wants to get it on with the other. But once the proposition to do this "erotic art project" is suggested during a bacchanalian dinner party, neither of the macho guys will be the first to back down. You can blame it on good ol' male pride; these heterosexuals would rather get their Genet on than be seen as closed-minded. Besides, they tell themselves, it wouldn't be a gay sex film. "It's beyond gay." Methinks some people doth protest too much.

Director Lynn Shelton clearly knows she's got her finger right on the pressure point of masculinity, and the fact that this is screening in Utah—as in the state known for a religious organization that helped finance recent anti-gay-marriage legislation—made the film's premiere that much more anticipated. (Oh goody, we get to watch the locals squirm!) As the movie built to its climax, you could hear tiny bursts of uncomfortable laughter, especially once the duo enter their hotel room and set up the camcorder. The audience was prepping itself for maximum awkwardness, as two men "secure" in their sexuality were about to have a serious identity crisis. Only, well…

Here's the thing: Humpday hinges on a certain tension as to whether these longtime friends are going to "do it" or not, so to give away the ending would make me guilty of first-degree spoilsport-itude. (Those averse to even suggestions of hints of spoilers may want to stop reading now anyway.) But if you're going to peer into the fragile hetero-male psyche and set up a scenario with such richly transgressive potential, you need to see things through. You have to peel back the skin all the way and expose what lurks underneath, and that requires maintaining the courage of one's convictions. Without that, you have nothing but coy flirtations and easy outs. As much as you want Humpday to turn into some mumblecore 2.0 version of an Edward Albee play, it can't…or rather, it simply won't go there. You do get a surprisingly subtle performance from Baghead's Duplass (who knew the actor-director was capable of such nuance?) and one scene between Leonard and Alycia Delmore's long-suffering wife involving a Scotch-soaked faux pas that's damned near priceless. You don't, however, get the scathing look at the inbred homophobia of male relationships or sexual ambiguity that this film needs to deliver to work properly. It's too tame and noncommittal by half. What gets left unsaid in most Apatow blockbusters devoted to the bonds between immature man-children says more than this tepid toe-dip into deep waters ever will. Still, as of this writing, three distributors are circling the movie. Expect to see it in a theater near you soon.

Brotherly love, as opposed to bromance, is what you'll get from Rudo y Cursi, the new film from the creative team behind Y tu mamá también. (Readers will remember what that movie said about machismo, and the painful insights of the same-sex coupling at the end. No cop-outs there. Just sayin'.) Despite the fact that this comedy reunites the earlier work's two stars—Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna—and is directed by that hormonal road movie's co-writer, Carlos Cuarón, you shouldn't expect Y tu mamá también uno mas. Already a break-out hit in Mexico, Cuarón's chronicle of a sibling rivalry set in the world of professional soccer sticks to a much more populist route. Tenoch (Luna) is a hot-headed fruit picker trying to provide for his family, as well as keeping an eye on his shiftless half-brother, Julio (Bernal). Their weekly pick-up soccer game gets scouted; a penalty kick earns Julio a chance in the big leagues, where he ends up becoming a superstar forward nicknamed "Cursi." The bitter Tenoch eventually joins a rival team (his handle: Rudo) and becomes a brutish breakout goalie. Anyone who believes the two will be forced to square off during a big game should be lauded for their Narrative 101 knowledge.

Cuarón throws in several predictable turns—Julio lets fame go to his head, Tenoch has a gambling problem that will necessitate some convenient plot twists—and one interesting switch-up near the film's end. But we've been here before; it's just a matter of how much folks want to watch these two actors bicker, banter and butt heads, which is indeed a pleasure. Bernal and Luna have a sort of easy chemistry that could (and should) be franchised, so much so that I expect a series of Hope-Crosby style vehicles for the duo in the near future. (Rudo y Cursi Go to Zanzibar! Who's with me, people?) It's a pleasant, if ultimately insubstantial, crowd-pleaser though the rapturous reception that Bernal got at the premiere is a sign that Sony Pictures Classics's acquisition was a wise one.

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Stop us if you've heard this one: There are these New York City cops, see, and they've got it rough. One of them is a veteran (Richard Gere) who's seven days out from retiring; another is a vicious young maverick (Ethan Hawke) with a penchant for ripping off drug dealers. The last one (Don Cheadle) is deep undercover...so deep that he no longer knows what side he's on. What Brooklyn's Finest (ironic title alert) is doing at Sundance is anyone's guess. Unlike Antoine Fuqua's brilliant Training Day, his new Lumet-lite thriller doesn't have enough to add to the crowded crime-flick genre to justify the clichés on display. The movie proves a few things beyond a shadow of a doubt: Don Cheadle is physically incapable of giving a bad performance; Wesley Snipes can still channel that New Jack City swagger like a pro; and using a jukebox as a Greek chorus isn't always a good idea. (Playing "The Great Pretender" as Cheadle reveals he's the fuzz in disguise? Really? Also, I'm officially calling a moratorium on putting "Sympathy for the Devil" on sound tracks, unless your name is Scorsese.) Senator Films, the new outfit from former THINKfilm honcho Mark Urman, picked it up for a rumored $5 million, making this the first big fest purchase. Who says that the days of frivolous spending are gone for good?

Sundance icon: Chris Kelly