Butler's Cinema Scene

Dane Cook, Elizabeth Mitchell

“ANSWERS TO NOTHING” My rating: C

97 minutes | MPAA rating R

The multi-character, multi-plot melodrama can be very satisfying.

Robert Altman’s “Short Cuts,” the Oscar-winning “Crash” and Rodrigo Garcia’s excellent “Mother and Child,” for example, each scored big by following several plots united by a common themes (the alienating effects of modern life, race relations, parenthood).

Writer/director Matthew Leutwyler’s “Answers to Nothing” attempts something similar, giving us a sprawling drama unfolding in LA over several days in which the city is abuzz over the presumed kidnapping of a little girl.

But despite a cast of great depth and talent, there’s not much cinema magic here. Leutwyler and co-writer Gillian Vigman take a scattershot approach. They haven’t really focused on their themes — heck, they fail even to define them — and the resulting film seems adrift.

Julie Benz (“Dexter”) plays the detective in charge of the missing child case; a mother herself, she finds it hard to balance cool professionalism with her own maternal concerns.

Greg Germann (“Ally McBeal”) is a neighbor of the missing girl who becomes a suspect.

Couple Ryan and Kate (comic Dane Cook and Elizabeth Mitchell) are coping with infertility. She’s an attorney, he’s a shrink. Ryan is having a torrid affair with a struggling young rock singer (Aja Volkman). He also has a mother (Barbara Hershey) who may be in the early stages of dementia.

One of Ryan’s patients (Kali Hawk) is a an African American TV writer who admits to disliking almost all black people. She mellows a bit thanks to her relationship with a young guy (Zach Gilford) she meets while out on a run.

One of Kate’s clients is Drew (Miranda Bailey), a recovering alcoholic fighting for the right to care for her brain-damaged brother (Vincent Ventreska).

Then there are two loners galvanized by the case of the missing child — an elementary school teacher (Mark Kelly) and a furtive beat cop (Eric Palladino).

So there’s a lot going on here, with one plot line lapping over into others.

Trouble is, none of these narratives is well-developed enough to make “Answers to Nothing” particularly compelling. And a last-act reveal that shows one character to be not at all what we thought seems more like a gimmick than a great “aha” moment.

| Robert W. Butler