Review of Finding Bliss (2009) by Kyo 9 — 21 Apr 2011

Finding Bliss is stereotypical and formulaic, bland and unfunny -- there is nothing blissful about the tepid piece of trash masquerading as a romantic comedy. Leelee Sobieski (Joy Ride, Eyes Wide Shut, 88 Minutes) stars as a recent film school graduate who cannot find a respectable job with Garry Marshall (why his name was constantly thrown-around as representative of ALL of Hollywood baffles me).

As she is in desperate need of a job, she reluctantly/sheepishly takes a job as an editor at a porn studio named Grind Pictures that is ran by Kristen Johnston (TV's Third Rock from the Sun, Music & Lyrics) that also employs hot-shot director Matthew Davis (Tigerland, Legally Blonde, Below) whom she forms a quick attraction and relationship with.

Her problem is that she is a sexual prude and has been afraid of sexual labels since her early teenage years (she isn't a virgin; but she may as well be one). Her true motive for taking this porn-related job is that she hopes to use the soundstages and sets to secretly film her very own, respectable, independent film after everyone else leaves the studio at night.

Sadly, her film-within-a-film is even more lamentable that the one we are watching and there is NO WAY it'd ever be distributed etc. which makes Finding Bliss even that-much-more ridiculous. Her film, entitled "On the Virge", is cringe-inducing because of some gawd-awful dialogue and terrible acting (if I described it as either "wooden" and "stiff" one would get the idea of how wretched it all is -- without child-ishly laughing at those very words as a puns -- seriously, uck).

Denise Richards (Love Actually, Wild Things, The World Is Not Enough), Mircea Monroe (Tekken, The Ultimate Gift, Cellular) and Jamie Kennedy (Scream, Three Kings, Son of the Mask) all star as porn-stars who "double" for Sobieski (his name is Dick Harder) by trying to turn in "real" performances in her "after-hours" production.

Oh the double-entendres (!!) ... if only the film weren't lame, generic and so-cheap-looking that it couldn't even pass as tawdry (and that actually says it all -- it wishes it were tawdry!). Even with shots of the porn film (in the film), the film is unexciting.

It is amazing that a film about the porn industry is lame (this is NO Boogie Nights or Middle Men); but Finding Bliss is successful with this ... meaning it is BAD! The heart doesn't beat any faster from excitment; instead the eyes roll from sheer un-originality and the stomach may turn from some of the unfunny and unsexy moments of the faux-film already discussed.

One won't be finding bliss here.