Benson: What about music?
Caroline: That’s Elliot’s department, I trust him 100 percent on it.
Elliot: Funk.
Caroline: Are you insane, Elliot?

Director Michael Showalter doesn’t lay his focus on the reluctant hero, the man who is good looking and has it all, and he doesn’t focus on the pretty girl who has to decide between two men, he focuses on the man that the pretty girl doesn’t choose in all the romance comedies you’ve ever seen. What about him? There’s an underlying sadness behind this tragicomedy called “The Baxter”, and in spite of it being labeled a comedy, and being in its element a comedy, it’s still rather sad.

Elizabeth Banks shows off more of her “ideal woman” qualities that make her more and more of a worthwhile underrated actress, Michelle Williams builds up more of her indie cred while flaunting more “cute as a button” sensibility, and there’s Showalter, director, writer, and star. He’s what his grandmother calls a “Baxter”, a man who is nice, and kind, and friendly, but just not the man the ideal woman falls for in the end of the movie. You have to appreciate writers’ abilities to explore the obscure regions of genre obscurities, those small aspects of storytelling that are never delved into.

Showalter explores the other guy, the poor schmuck left at the altar that at the end of the film, you feel kind of bad for, but you just want to see the girl fall for the man she was meant to be with. Showalter a member of the Stella comedy group, including hilarious walk-ons from Michael Ian Black, Peter Dinklage, and Paul Rudd, inserts his “so absurd, it’s funny” niche that makes “The Baxter” so entertaining. He brags about reading the dictionary with his secretary who is also doing the same, and boasts about going to Yellowstone on his honeymoon. Elliot (The Baxter) is a nice guy, but not a guy you can completely root for, and Showalter counts on that. This gives Elliot the chance to bring audiences into his point of view, and when you’re done, you’ll find yourself slightly more sympathetic towards “the other guy” in romances.

And you have to feel sorry for Elliot who can never step forward to confess his love for the women he meets and always gets outshined by someone else who enlists a cliché to win the woman. Hell, one guy even shows up with a sign that reads “I’m Sorry”, and a puppy. Justin Theroux gives a hysterical performance playing “the other guy”, a man named Bradley who is never afraid to flaunt his success, and purposely undermines Elliot in front of his wife to be. The clear message of “The Baxter” is that you have to take what you want in life, and the reason why Elliot can’t get “the girl” is because he sabotages himself and doesn’t fight back.

But Showalter also spoofs romance comedies by inserting clichés and predictable twists at every turn. When Caroline insists to a paranoid Elliot, “It would take an act of god for Bradley and me to ever cross paths again”, Bradley appears only a split second later in a convenient “accidental meeting”, and Elliot is trying to win Caroline while he finds he’s slightly crushing over his secretary Cecil, who happens to be “the other girl”. Will the other guy win the other girl, or will the other guy fall for the ideal girl? Well, does “the other guy” ever get the girl in these romances?

Showalter's film is a creative look an obscure facet of the romance genre that's never touched upon. With great performances, and an original concept, "The Baxter" is an entertaining bit of comedy.

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