Looking for Kitty Movie Review

In the director's notes included with the DVD of Looking for Kitty, Edward Burns remarks about how easy it is to shoot a film on a low budget, using digital video, existing locations, and the like. You don't even need to write a script!

Well just because you can do these things doesn't mean you should, and sure enough Looking for Kitty is the type of movie that rank amateurs usually turn in, an undercooked affair that doesn't offer any emotional response and which could have used a whole lot of vetting from people who weren't attached to a singular idea. It's nowhere near Burns' best work. I dare use a word I try to avoid in film criticism: It's just boring.

Looking for Kitty isn't about a lost cat, though that might have been more interesting. Rather, the familiar setup gives us simple high-school baseball coach Abe (David Krumholtz) looking for his wife, who's run away to Manhattan, probably because Abe is such an unadventurous bore. (He's never even tried Chinese food!) In Manhattan, Abe hooks up with a private detective named Jack (Burns), who's got mental problems of his own. (He refuses to eat in a restaurant!) Together, these two tag along for a week until the case is concluded, though telling you what happens would spoil whatever interest Looking for Kitty might hold for you.

Like real-life P.I. work, much of Kitty is consumed with standing around as Abe and Jack stake out locations or absurdly interrogate people Kitty might have encountered. Though both men are happy to talk about their relationship problems, we don't really come to care about them. They're just too dull, and we start to sympathize with the women who left them both behind. It's more entertaining just to stare at Krumholtz's bushy mustache, frankly.

DVD extras include a commentary from Burns and an alternate opening.

Shave that thing!