The Pallbearer 1996, Rated PG-13

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Starring David Schwimmer, Gwyneth Paltrow, et al.

I must admit, I didn't think that it'd be any time in the near future that I got to see David Schwimmer playing a character with less backbone than Ross, the drippy, and slightly nerdy character Schwimmer portrays on Friends. Just as I was surprised by Michael Richards' (Seinfeld's Kramer) prat-falling appearance in Trial and Error, I was surprised that Schwimmer would accept to star in a romantic comedy playing the same guy he is known for playing on television. To give his silver screen career the boost it needs, Schwimmer needs to go off the deep end; play a serial killer with a tendency to "make friends" with little boys, or to play male prostitute. Hell, if Schwimmer was that interested in breaking his stereotype of being a nice, dorky guy he could play a female prostitute and really shake things up, but hindsight is always 20/20.

Like the '96 release Commandments, The Pallbearer has a dynamite premise, whose writer-director, Matt Reeves, just couldn't capitalize on it. Schwimmer stars as Tom Thompson, a 25 year-old, would-be architect, living at home with his mom (Carol Kane). Out of the blue, Tom receives a call from a hysterical crying woman, who tells him that an old high school classmate of his, Bill Abernathie, has died, and had asked for him to be a pallbearer at the funeral. The catch? No matter how hard he tries, neither Tom, nor any of his friends, can remember Abernathie. However, Tom, being the nice guy he is, agrees to be a pallbearer, not wanting to hurt anyone's feelings. As time passes, Tom is asked to deliver the eulogy, help clean up Abernathie's belongings, and is shocked to find himself in Abernathie's will as the recipient of Abernathie's AMC Gremlin.

This is precisely the kind of dark, macabre, situational humor that I love to see. Unfortunately though, Reeves and co-writer Jason Katims don't focus their energy on the portion of their script that set it apart from 95% of the other films produced today. Instead of examining the seemingly impossible situation that Tom has become involved in, Reeves and Katims work on hooking Tom up with his love interest, Julie DeMarco (Gwenneth Paltrow). Once the log-headed Schwimmer and the rather wooden Paltrow hook up, the entirety of the movie shifts onto their relationship, and away from the premise, which made The Pallbearer seem so damn interesting in the first place.

Reeves and Katims do demonstrate a knack for creating comedically off-balance characters, Kane especially captures the essence of her character well, and the two appear to be able to add enough little details--the fact that Tom still sleeps in a bunk-bed--to make the production three dimensional, but these are elements that are important if, and only if, the material being examined is interesting and solid in its own right.

The first 30 minutes of The Pallbearer possessed the quirky rhythm, and dark humor that I think more films need to have, but this disappeared as quickly as it arrived. During the last 70 minutes of this movie, I kept waiting, and hoping, that more awkward scenes revolving around Tom's lack of knowledge about Abernathie would surface, but Tom getting it on with Abernathie's mom (Barbara Hershey), was about as awkward, and unbelievable, as it got.

Reeves' style of direction, with the particularly fascinating use of scenes with only a haunting piano composition playing softly in the background was solid, but his script wasn't as lucky. Romantic comedies and dead bodies usually don't go together, The Pallbearer was no exception to this rule.