By Scott Marks | SDUN Film Critic

For years this joke was best put to use when referencing ego-driven actors aching to make the leap to the director’s chair. Nowadays it’s getting even bigger laughs when linked to small screen executive producers with entitlement issues. “The X-Files‘” R. W. Goodwin (“Alien Trespass”), “Lost‘s” J.J. Abrams (“Star Trek”) and “The West Wing‘s” John Wells (“The Company Men”) all took the plunge and now Richard Levine’s (“Nip/Tuck”) name can be added to the list of auteur wannabes.

Having never watched an episode of “Star Trek,” I can’t vouch for the quality of Abrams’ recent big screen update, but if the other three crossovers are any indication it’s damn near impossible for the money men to swim clear of the wellspring.

Ned (Liev Schreiber) is a frustrated artist forced by fate (and a mortgage) to write for a vulgar sitcom which pays him handsomely to come up with fresh spins on sodomy and bestiality jokes. “Sex with one’s dog is the new sex with one’s cat,” spouts a colleague during a writing session. His boss’s (the electrifyingly crude Eddie Izzard) daily affirmation is “I don’t give a (bleep) about ‘unrelatability’ as long as it is shocking!” Right now Ned is more concerned with how he’s going to deny his teenage son Jonah’s (Ezra Miller) pleas to attend a gay college prom—overprotective dad fears that an oversexed jock might put the moves on his oldest boy—and the prospects of his cantankerous, widowed father-in-law Ernie (Brian Dennehy) about to move in with the family.

With a screen that’s wider than 100-inches in diameter as his canvas, one would hope that even a TV mentality would rejoice in all the extra space afforded them instead of playing out gags in a manner resembling a jackhammer. When Jeannie (Helen Hunt) wheels her father through the airport the camera deliberately zeroes in on incontinent Ernie’s soiled trousers. No sooner does Ned meet them at the gate, the same gag is played out in an identical manner just in case you missed it the first time.

“Every Day” is not without its share of insightful moments and the cast—particularly Schreiber and the perpetually underused Denney—does its best to elevate the formulaic material, but this is another film that would consider itself a failure were it not for its ability to make audiences feel like crap. Ernie’s bitter, profane (and lame) asides are as close as we get to comic relief as sorrow quickly piles upon tragedy leaving an unrelentingly depressing soap opera in its wake.

“Every Day” is currently playing an exclusive engagement at Reading Cinemas Gaslamp 15.

Details:

Written and Directed by Richard Levine

Starring: Liev Schreiber, Helen Hunt, Carla Gugino, Brian Dennehy and Eddie Izzard

Rating: 1.5