Sean Garrity (Canada)
Sean Garrity's improv-generated Inertia, a candid, fitfully funny debut about relationship and personality friction, plays like a Mike Leigh (or Bruce Sweeney) film that comes perilously close to working - but lacks Leigh or Sweeney's rigour. Such hot-button issues as abortion rights and a potential water poisoning stand alongside the complicated romantic entanglements of city worker Jonas (Jonas Chechick), his extremely promiscuous Catholic girls' school teacher girlfriend (Sarah Constible), his best friend, an information-technology worker (Gord Tanner) and his cousin (Micheline Marchildon) - all of whom lust after their most awkward match. Inertia falters when Garrity's direction, some interesting camera placing and visual metaphors aside, distracts from the often clever script. The last act takes an unwelcome turn, as the characters' irreconcilable desires (and Jonas's queasy self-delusion) reach the point of endgame. All told, it's a smart enough effort, though slightly disappointing, considering its potential. - MarkP.

(Wed., Sept. 12, 6 p.m., Varsity; Fri., Sept. 14, 12:15 p.m., Varsity)