Feature Review | Never Again
Written by: Brian Orndorf

I realize there are many directors working today that make you wonder just how they keep going when their films are just so exceptionally ghastly. But one director in particular, Eric Schaeffer, is a certified triple threat in that his films always stink, they are rarely (if at all) profitable, and his acting is atrocious. Yet almost every other year, Schaeffer has a new movie to offer. I'll understand the cold fusion theory before I can wrap my mind around Schaeffer's seemingly unstoppable career.

"Never Again" is Schaeffer's fifth movie (don't feel bad if you've never heard of him), and thankfully he chose to sit this one out as an actor. The story centers around 50-something Christopher (Jeffrey Tambor, “The Larry Sanders Show“), a lonely and depressed exterminator, and sometimes jazz pianist, who finds himself sexually unfulfilled. Reaching out for new horizons, Christopher ends up at a gay bar one night, and bumps into Grace (Jill Clayburgh). Grace is suffering from the very same romantic problems, now compounded by the recent departure of her collage-aged daughter. While both partners are firm in their belief that they will "never again" fall in love, the duo eventually does, and their exploration of modern sexuality and emotional frigidity provides the backdrop to their romance.

What "Never Again" benefits from that other Schaeffer turkeys have always managed to avoid is good intentions. I respect Schaeffer for going out there and providing such strong lead roles for these somewhat older actors. Besides the recent "Divine Secrets Of The Ya-Ya Sisterhood," there just aren't many films based around the lives of people 50 and up, and certainly not romantically (or sexually) inclined features. Tambor and Clayburgh take this opportunity very seriously, and dive right into their roles no matter what Schaeffer subjects them to. It makes for two very powerful performances in a film that doesn't deserve them.

In depicting the current sexual climate, Schaeffer runs his characters through every conceivable activity. "Never Again" is decidedly frank in its sex talk, and, since Schaeffer has no writing abilities to speak of, the film treats certain lifestyles and sex acts (homosexuality, transvestitism, asphyxiation, S&M) without the respect they deserve. And what doesn't get made fun of is instead handled with a dead-on creepiness that made me want to poke my own eyes out. Trust me, if you can sleep nights after seeing Jill Clayburgh in an S&M hood with a strap-on mounted to her midsection, you are a better person than I.

Ditto scenes where Sandy Duncan (yes, that Sandy Duncan) is paging through a sex toy catalog, or when Clayburgh goes shopping at a sex shop and inquires about the anal toys. Good heavens, Mr. Schaeffer…

While the blunt sexuality of "Never Again" is a novelty that keeps it at least memorable (though in all the wrong ways), Schaeffer soon crumbles and begins to guide his film through depressingly familiar romantic comedy terrain. You know the routine, the "we are happy," "we must break up," "I can't live without you" tripe that has been seen even more times in popular culture than that "Cosby Show" episode where Rudy lip-synchs.

Not that this hurts the film any, as "Never Again" is an endurance test to start with, but when a director deliberately sends his own film down such a well-worn path, you know you're in the presence of a truly bad director. Undoubtedly, there will be another Eric Schaeffer film in the future, as even with another flop like "Never Again" to his name, like the Terminator, he'll just keep coming back.

Grade: 1 out of 10