Was this the season of long movies? This film gave me the worst case of bleacher butt I can recall in quite a while. I'm not sure that is very high praise, especially if it's in the first paragraph of a review.

There's an old man (Jason Robards) dying. His young wife (Miss Julianne Moore - love her) married him for money but now loves him and take lots of drugs. A male nurse (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) takes good care of him.

The old man's production company airs a kid's game snow. The show's host visits his estranged, cocaine-addicted daughter to tell her he's dying of cancer before going on the air. She yells at him. The policeman answering the domestic disturbance call is smitten with the attractive druggie.

The game show, featuring an opera-singing prodigy with a bladder control problem, is watched by a man (William H. Macy) that was a former child star on the same program. His life has hit the skids as he competes for the affection of a hunky bartender with a dandy dressing fool with plenty of snide remarks (Henry Gibson).

Before he dies, the old man (Robards) wants to see his estranged son (Tom Cruise - looking really hot with his shirt off). Too bad Tom is a smut king.

Obviously, in the grand tradition of butt busting movies, all the stories are intertwined. The acting is great all the way around (although the smart kid on the game show gave me the creeps). At one point, all the major characters lip synch to the same Aimee Mann song (the soundtrack if full of her great songs) in different scenes. It was strange to see, but oddly alluring. I was interested in the outcome of the movie until it hit the two hour and fifteen minute mark and a disaster of Biblical proportions strikes Los Angeles and changes the lives of all the characters. I'm sure that event had some deep, significant meaning, but it was lost on me. (If you understood it, please send me an E-mail.)

Listen to me: I'm not sure it was worth the butt-numbing length to appear cool by having been to see this movie - and I live to be cool.

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