The Opposite of Sex

What passes for independent films these days seems to have confused irony with voiceover narration. Last week director Noah Baumbach spoiled a catchy concept in his Mr. Jealousy by belaboring it with his tiresome commentary. This week, in Don Roos's insufferable The Opposite of Sex, we're harangued throughout its smarmy, pseudo-hip shenanigans by the smug asides of Christina Ricci, who's fast becoming the Monica Lewinsky of indie cinema.

She's teenage tough cookie Dedee Truitt, whose opening pronouncement that good-hearted people are boring and only crass, amoral predators like herself are cool proves correct only on the first count. Tricked up as a Baby Doll for the '90s, she leaves the Louisiana funeral of her abusive stepfather to crash in on her half-brother Bill (Martin Donovan), a long-suffering high-school English teacher in Indiana. In short order she seduces Bill's dumb but studly lover Matt (Ivan Sergei) and sets off a series of misadventures whose contrivance is exceeded only by their bad taste. Incapable even of maintaining its black-comic, anarchic pose without slipping into hypocritical sentimentality, this film proves the opposite not only of sex but of everything else that is passionate, spontaneous, human, and fun. Opens Friday at the Avon Cinema and Jane Pickens Theater.

-- Peter Keough