Little known fact. Lady Gaga was this close to titling her song Office Romance instead of Bad Romance. Don’t fact check me. But, the fairly generic title found its way into Jennifer Lopez’s pantheon of equally vague titles like The Back Up Plan, Marry Me, and Unstoppable (a title so generic Denzel also has a film called Unstoppable). Regardless of the premise, Jennifer Lopez remains a queen of romantic comedies, and her sex appeal at 56 has allowed her to be able to pull off being desirable enough to carry films like this. Jennifer Lopez is not the problem here.

The plot has Lopez as the CEO of an airline, one she has grown, despite a board that seems less than enthused about her performance. She’s in the middle of trying to acquire some gates at a new wing on the Dallas airport, but a rival (Roger Bart) sues for being a sore loser, and she has to do a deposition. She is originally supposed to have the help of her lead counsel (Bradley Whitford), but after he has a food catastrophe, she’s left with another lawyer (Brett Goldstein) who is instantly (and uncomfortably) enamored with her beauty.

This creates a problem, because her company has a zero tolerance policy on dating co-workers,so as she becomes charmed by his… ability to breathe and speak in complete sentences… she crosses that line with him. Other notable cast include Edward James Olmos as her father, Betty Gilpin as her pregnant assistant, and Tony Hale as HR.

The biggest problem in the film is Goldstein. To be fair, some critics like what he does, but he has no personality. I’m not sure what his “brand” is, as a comedian, because after seeing his Apple film last year, All Of Us, and now this, I’m confused by what he thinks of himself, and how he interprets human traits in his films. Here he has an extended scene where he has to explain that British people interchangeable use the word “cunt” all the time. Instead of making a more pointed commentary on it, he chooses for his character to just ramble, and definitely list times in which no one actually uses that.

I love his Roy Kent. I think he’s great as the emotionally drained special friend from Jimmy’s past in Shrinking. But here, he tries to be a bit like a beta male in this role, and his character is uptight, and refusing to overshare with colleagues. The conflict arises when Lopez finds out he’s been seeing a family member in jail, a plot point that is unnecessary and provides for a weak hill for Lopez to die on.

And for two actors who spent their press tour casually hinting that maybe there was some backstage romance, they have no chemistry. Part of it is that the screenplay, co-written by Goldstein, is not very good, and the other is that Goldstein is just too bland. I keep thinking of actors who could have made this role work, including his Shrinking co-star Jason Segal, the charismatic Glen Powell, Adam Scott’s snarky and intelligent appeal, or Jack Quaid, who feels like he could have killed this part. I could have listed a bunch of names to Netflix to test against Lopez to find her an attractive younger male screen partner, and found someone who understood the softer more romantic side, but also the humor. There’s an attempt to make Goldstein a star, but considering his films keep skipping theaters, it isn’t a very formidible one.

I also think the film whiffed its reunion with Olmos and Lopez, mainly because the father character becomes an odd point of contention, like she can’t ever really fly if his opinion is in the room. I thought there were some lovely fleeting moments between them, and knowing they had this relationship together in Selena, and it worked there, I would have changed the script to better reflect and support two people who seem genuinely happy to see each other.

What did work, keeping this film from utter ruin, was Lopez, who navigates a troubled script with the same level of charm she always has. She doesn’t really scream CEO of an airline to me, but this is a film that also has Bradley Whitford basically doing his schtick from Billy Madison, to unfunny results. No one really seems to know how to make this movie work, except to pray J.Lo fans will show up anyway. They will, and for once, they’ll likely see she’s not the problem here. This isn’t a miscast on her part. I also really enjoyed Gilpin as her assistant. I always enjoy her, but she absolutely understood the assignment and makes great use of all her screentime, no matter how nonsensical the request.

Part of me wanted to request an advance on this, because I was mildly interested, but after Ladies First, I’ve started to temper my expectations. Every once in a while, a Netflix film really pops and stands out, that isn’t part of their Oscar slate, but this isn’t it. I also wasn’t that big of a fan of the AD track. There were times where I felt I was missing a visual cue, though it did seem to pick up a lot. But the AD, as an example, leaves an erection sequence undefined, so it’s unclear if sighted audiences can see it or not. Since there’s such a huge focus on it, and all the other pratfalls Goldstein thinks are funny, I can’t imagine they didn’t go for a shot of him standing attention.

I’m concerned about the direction of Goldstein’s career, but more importantly, I think he’s the weak link here. As a writer and actor, he really has provided nothing to work with, or at least nothing that dozens of other actors couldn’t have done, and done more with. Some people fit perfectly into romantic comedies, and some don’t. Goldstein has a few things he is good at, and romance movies isn’t one of them.

I’ll be the one to lay the blame on Goldstein, who not only wrote himself a lousy part, he also has no idea how to pass off as the charming Brit that actors like Hugh Grant and Colin Firth made their bread and butter.

Rotten: 5.1/10