Danny is a single guy who lives in the Windy City and struggle to balance their desire for sex with the possibility of love. When Danny meets Debbie, the two start a relationship from a one-night stand, despite their personal problems and the interference of their disapproving friends.
The shocks of recognition are largely absorbed by the standard narrative structure that replaces Mamet's blackouts; the characters, instead of functioning as archetypes, look underwritten, half alive.
Homework assignment: Is the decision to change both the title and the thrust of Mamet's play evidence of perversity or of perversion? Due tomorrow. Class dismissed.
What emerges on the screen, however, is largely bland and prettified, virtually indistinguishable from any other trendy Hollywood romance of its period.
Lowe and Moore do well as the on-again, off-again partners, although it is James Belushi, in an over-the-top supporting performance his brother John would have been proud of, who all but walks off with the show.
The screenwriters work many nice little observations into their occasionally over-quippish script, but this is considerably smaller than the sum of its parts.
Writers DeClue and Kazurinsky have created a recognizable geography for every age; you suspect that About Last Night will set off pangs of identification everywhere.
