When news broke that Labor Pains, Lindsay Lohan's purported "comeback movie," would not receive a theatrical release but would rather be banished to direct-to-DVD hell, the young starlet was saddened. This was supposed to be the project that brought her back to the A-list. Instead, it is now just another punch-line for the tabloids to work with. And for the record, Labor Pains is one of the cruelest punch-lines of them all -- because if Lindsay thought this movie was ever going to hit theater screens, the joke was on her.

The film is a would-be comedy about fake pregnancy, one of the most tired, unfunny premises in the book. To that premise Labor Pains adds crude caricatures, awkward gags, and a plot so predictable, so limp, so lacking in common sense that it makes Georgia Rule look a documentary. Comedy might indeed be the right genre for the megastar-turned-tabloid punching bag, but it's not really the talent that's to blame in this movie -- it's the material itself. The only thing we should blame Lindsay Lohan, Cheryl Hines, or any of the film's other performers for is signing the dotted line. This screenplay couldn't have seemed good enough to film, could it?

Lohan plays Thea, a put-upon secretary at a fledgling publishing agency who just can't seem to get the respect she deserves. Her boss (Chris Parnell, whose performance indicates he may have confused this movie with an SNL skit) is a blathering jerk who wants to fire her for no reason, most of her co-workers act like barbarians, and she is generally ignored for any good ideas she comes up with. Her personal life is in shambles as well -- her boyfriend (Aaron Yoo) suffers from a bad case of arrested development, and her young sister (Bridgit Mendler), for whom she also serves as a guardian, has started cutting classes. If anyone is more in need of a fake pregnancy to jump-start her life and career, it's Thea.

And so it goes. Thea hatches the pregnancy plan with her office gal-pal, Lisa (Hines, way too good for this material), to create the ridiculously farcical scenario that will surely allow her to keep her job, since the HR department would never allow the boss to axe a pregnant woman. Of course, not only does Thea keep her job, she excels on every front. People treat her with respect, her superiors listen to her ideas, and everyone wants to bake her brownies.

Watching Labor Pains, one tends to tire of the lame humor, implausible story, and poorly-lit, sloppily-edited mise en scene. To ease my pain, I started playing a game with myself. I assumed that I was about ten steps ahead of the screenplay, so I mapped out in my head precisely how the movie would unfold. Here's what I came up with: by random chance (or manipulation by the screenwriter), the boss is pulled away on business, leaving his cute-but-shy underling in charge. Thea, of course, blossoms under the new guy, who not only gives Thea a promotion, but takes her out on a series of cute dates intended to make us root for them to end up together. Thea then must obviously come clean to her new beau (most likely in a very public place with every peripheral character standing and watching), thereby risking her job and her new love. The guy, being a saintly altruist, takes great offense to Thea's psychotic rouse and storms out. Time will pass, and somehow Thea will find a way to redeem herself both to her company and her beau. Then music will swell as the couple embraces, and the happiness will fade to black. A card will then fade in reading, "9 months later" or some such time period, at which time Thea will rummage through her office barking professional orders while the entire workforce bows at her feet. Then she will get up from her desk, revealing her (legitimately this time) pregnant belly. Cute. Lovely. The End.

Of course, maybe that's not how the movie ends. I'll never tell.



Get in ma belly!