The Next Best Thing (2000): Dir: John Schlesinger / Cast: Madonna, Rupert Everett, Benjamin Bratt, Illeana Douglas, Lynn Redgrave: Miserable sack of trash with a title that swerves around the issue of sex and friendship. Friendship is not the next best thing to a stupid sexual fling. Madonna and Rupert Everett are best friends. He is gay and the father of her baby after one drunken night. It is a bitter film that boils down to a custody battle when Madonna is engaged to someone she met in Yoga class. It jumps from Madonna in labour to her son at six years old in a matter of a scene that strikes as confusing without subtitles. The ending is slapped on and awkward. Dreadful directing by John Schlesinger who once made superb films such as Marathon Man and Midnight Cowboy. Now he directs this garbage just after directing another crap fest called Eye for an Eye. Madonna is hideous in a role that is very unsympathetic. Is it possible that this is her worst performance or is this one of her many toss ups? Everett fares far better as someone wrestling with his sexuality as well as friendship and potential fatherhood. Benjamin Bratt's performance as Madonna's Yoga class boy toy is about as inspiring as a kick in the ass. Illeana Douglas and Lynn Redgrave also make the mistake of showing up in this. Pointless soap opera where the next best thing is a paper bag to vomit in. Score: ½ / 10

Firm-bodied California yoga teacher Madonna (as Abbie Reynolds) suffers the end of a relationship, which is sad because she is getting older and wants to have a baby. Her gay landscaper pal Rupert Everett (as Robert Whittaker) suggests Madonna become a single mom through anonymous fertilization, but she wants a love child. Being best friends, they have too much to drink one night and copulate. Madonna learns she is pregnant. She and Mr. Everett decide to live together and raise their son, who very quickly grows into Malcolm Stumpf (as Sam)...All goes well until Madonna attracts reluctant yoga student Benjamin Bratt (as Ben Cooper). Now a foursome, the cast has a problem because Mr. Bratt, a self-described workaholic, has to move east for a better job position. He could live luxuriously as a California yoga teacher, but whatever... This well-intentioned story, unfortunately the last film directed by John Schlesinger, is more concerned with how to present a seemingly self-absorbed star than it is with filmmaking. Everett should have taken the kid and moved in with Neil Patrick Harris (as David).**** The Next Best Thing (3/3/00) John Schlesinger ~ Madonna, Rupert Everett, Benjamin Bratt, Malcolm Stumpf

There are many films that I have rated 1 out of 10 that do not deserve the shame of being equated with this film. I am a very ardent Madonna fan; however, this is easily the worst film that I have ever seen. The script and the performances were so bad in spots that I felt nauseous with embarrassment. I couldn't look at the screen. My eyes went south and I was left with Madonna's voice sounding through the screen slipping nightmarishly in and out of a British accent. The plot was poor to begin with but the film was so badly put together that large time lapses left you confused and disoriented. Friends-jump-lovers-jump-enemies-jump-court-jump-friends-huh? what? Do yourself a favour- never, ever, ever watch this film. Unless you've always wondered, just how bad a movie can be. For all of those films that I've rated with one star (Xanadu, JAWS:The Revenge, etc...), I'm sorry; you are much better than this film.

Mercilessly condemned by viewers and professional critics, this comedy-drama is not very good; but I have seen films that are a lot worse. A young woman named Abbie (Madonna), who is straight, has a one-night fling with her best friend Robert (Rupert Everett), who is gay. The result is that she gets pregnant. Abbie and Robert agree to raise the child together; but complications ensue when Abbie falls in love with someone else.The first part of the film is lighthearted, and plays like a music video, with some good songs, like "Steppin' Out With My Baby". By the time we get into the second half, however, the lightheartedness has morphed into bitterness and controversy, a change in tone that is jarringly out of sync with earlier sequences.But an even bigger problem is the casting of the two leads, and the Robert character. Madonna tries hard to be a convincing Abbie; her performance isn't bad, really it isn't; she's just a little too wooden. But her celebrity persona as a musical pop star overwhelms all effort to make her seem like some average homebody. As a result, I would have preferred another actress.I did not care for Robert at all, with his exaggerated attempts at witty banter and his fluttering about, typical gay stereotyped behavior, vain and self-absorbed. Later, he becomes rigid in his ability to compromise, a character contrivance that only serves to advance the film's plot. And then Rupert Everett, with his hammy overacting, makes the already flamboyant Robert character almost unendurable. Everett's British accent in a Southern California setting is totally out of place. Almost any other actor of comparable age could have rendered a less painful performance.What makes the film bearable is some good music, including Don McClean's old song "American Pie", and a nifty performance by Malcolm Stumpf as the child, a performance that was thankfully lacking in precocious behavior so often seen in child characters.If they had reworked the script in such a way as to have a more consistent storyline, toned down the Robert character, and chosen different performers for the two lead roles, "The Next Best Thing" might have been better received. As is, the film is interesting mainly for its music, and as a textbook case of what can go wrong when script and casting mistakes are not corrected.