Stars’ Chemistry Helps Keep ‘Down to You’ Afloat

Freddie Prinze Jr. and Julia Stiles are as appealing a pair of young lovers as you could wish for. And as long as first-time writer-director Kris Isacsson focuses squarely on them, “Down to You” plays well as a story of how two intelligent, privileged people meet in college, then fall passionately in love lots faster than they were prepared for.

Once they get used to each other, they start realizing that they are in no way ready for a major commitment, let alone marriage, yet their deep bond remains. Perhaps they will find the emotional maturity to start over--or move on separately. The way in which their relationship develops, and the ways in which they deal with it and each other is engaging.

But while “Down to You” shows its young stars, who have a potent chemistry between them, to fine advantage, the film itself is mediocre at best. Isacsson unfortunately weighs down his highly romantic movie with an over-abundance of narration and asides to the camera from Prinze’s Al and Stiles’ Imogen.

Isacsson, furthermore, does himself no favors by casting Al’s and Imogen’s observations and confidences ahead of the action, which makes the film in effect unfold as a flashback. This needlessly gives the film a feeling of taking place in the past tense just when it’s most in need of forward momentum. As a result, “Down to You” plays as if it’s at least a two-hour movie when it’s actually only 89 minutes.

Clearly, Isacsson cares deeply for his lovers and takes pains to make them persuasive and worth caring about. But it would seem, however, that his commitment to telling their story has used up all his imagination and falls back on shtick to characterize the supporting roles. Shawn Hatosy, who has been making a terrific impression in one film after another, is stuck playing a numskull. Zak Orth fares better, cast as an aspiring actor who seems to be envisioning himself as another Orson Welles.

“Down to You” summons too many images of too many other movies just when you should be feeling that Al and Imogen’s love story is happening in the real world. (Typical for student love stories, you are given the impression that nobody studies and everybody parties all the time.) Henry Winkler plays Al’s loving father, a durably popular TV chef, and Lucie Arnaz, as Al’s DJ mother, has so little screen time that it’s all she can do to register vivaciousness.

“Down to You” takes place in a glossy Manhattan, accompanied by a throbbing rock score too reminiscent of the tracks of a zillion other pictures. Isacsson, however, has poured so much feeling into Al and Imogen and directed Prinze and Stiles to play them so effectively that the picture does them more good than harm. In the meantime, the best the makers of “Down to You” can hope for is that girls in their early teens--clearly the film’s target audience--will be so carried away by its charismatic stars that they’ll overlook the film’s various flaws.

* MPAA rating: PG-13, for mature thematic material, sexual content, language, drug and alcohol use. Times guidelines: language, adult themes and situations.

‘Down to You’

Freddie Prinze Jr.: Al Connelly

Julia Stiles: Imogen

Lucie Arnaz: Judy Connelly

Henry Winkler: Chef Ray

A Miramax Films presentation of an Open City Films production. Writer-director Kris Isacsson. Producers Jason Kliot, Joana Vicente. Executive producers Bobby Cohen, Bob Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein, Jeremy Kramer. Cinematographer Robert Yeoman. Editor Stephen A. Rotter. Music Edmund Choi. Production designer Kevin Thompson. Set decorator Ford Wheeler. Running time: 1 hour, 29 minutes.

In general release.