'Definitely, Maybe' a crackling romantic charmer, despite draggy finale

By: Christy Lemire, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Surely it's not too early to feel nostalgic for 1992. After all, it was 16 whole years ago. No iPods yet - and those clunky cell phones! Kurt Cobain was still alive and Bill Clinton hadn't even met Monica Lewinsky, much less had sexual relations with that woman. Thankfully, writer-director Adam Brooks doesn't wallow too obnoxiously in the not-so-distant kitsch with "Definitely, Maybe," a surprisingly clever romantic comedy that starts brightly but unfortunately loses its spark at the end. He mainly uses the period to establish the story of Ryan Reynolds'Will, a disillusioned New York ad man who's just been served divorce papers when the movie opens. That afternoon, he picks up his 10-year-old daughter Maya (the always adorable Abigail Breslin) from school and is horrified to discover that she and her classmates have had a sex education lesson, which prompts a flurry of uncomfortable questions about where she came from and who else Will dated besides her mom. (Maya has fun using the new terminology she's learned that day, loudly and often.) And so Will reluctantly tells her of his romantic past as a bedtime story, changing the names so that she (and we) won't know which girlfriend became her mother until the end. There's Emily (Elizabeth Banks), his wholesome college sweetheart from Wisconsin; April (Isla Fisher), a flighty but quick-witted aide he meets while working on Clinton's presidential campaign; and the sophisticated writer Summer (Rachel Weisz), who's out of his league. Brooks, who previously co-wrote the flat sequel "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason" and the reasonably pleasing "Wimbledon," jumps back and forth between Will's recollections of his various interludes and his present-day attempts to keep them clean for his daughter, who chimes in with sweet and frequently smart-alecky commentary. (If Breslin seems too precocious, you're too cynical.) His characters are distinctly drawn and well cast, with each woman believably shaping Will into the man he becomes. And Reynolds, who is in every scene, continues to move beyond such raunchy comedies as "Van Wilder" and "Waiting ..." to establish himself as a viable leading man, with terrific looks and even better comic timing. He has especially great chemistry with the effervescent Fisher, who is as irresistible here as she was in "Wedding Crashers"; when they're together, as close friends who clearly long to be more, they make "Definitely, Maybe" feel like a throwback to the classics of the genre. Banks, who is a bit underused, brings a sense of warmth and calm to the film, while Weisz sexes things up. Kevin Kline has a couple of crackling scenes as Summer's mentor and lover - a prolific, drunk writer whom Will mistakes for her father in his initial innocence. But while Brooks has made an inventive romantic comedy - something that seems impossible to do these days - his ending takes way too long and makes too many twists. We have to slog through repeated permutations of who Maya's mom might have been and who Will's soul mate might be. (If you're paying attention, there's a hint in the lyrics of a Vanessa Williams song that plays at one point.) It is amusing and especially timely, though, that Will's optimism mirrors that of the Clinton administration. When we first meet him, he's out to change the world, too, and perhaps become president himself someday. In time, he learns too much about the candidate in whom he had so much faith, and about the women to whom he opened his heart; the knowledge hardens him, leaving him depressed and jaded. Brooks says he finished the script just before Hillary Rodham Clinton announced her run for the White House, but the timing is a hoot. So is a comment from Derek Luke as Will's best friend on the campaign staff, who has his own dreams of becoming the nation's first black president. Three stars out of four.