The Pompatus of Love is a 1996 American comedy film that tells the story of four guys discussing women and the meaning of the word "pompatus". This made-up word is found in two Steve Miller songs, "Enter Maurice" and "The Joker", the latter of which contains the line "Some people call me Maurice / 'cause I speak of the pompatus of love". Wolfman Jack can also be heard using the term in his spoken lines in The Guess Who's "Clap for the Wolfman." The low-budget, independent film received mostly negative reviews.
Plot
The film revolves around four friends and their relationships with women. Set to the background of upscale Manhattan bars, lofts and apartments, the guys engage in sharp banter and one-upsmanship. The characters, Mark, a therapist ; Runyon, a playwright ; Josh, a playboy and Phil, a plumber, try to sort out their troubled love-lives. Mark and his girlfriend are hung up over moving in together; Runyon is hung up over his old girlfriend Kathryn, who has moved to Los Angeles; the womanizing Josh is hung up on Phil's sister, Gina, who has an abusive husband; Phil, who is married with children, finds himself hung up on an English interior designer. The characters in the film spend much of their time trying to decipher the word "pompatus," wondering whether they are mis-hearing the lyrics: "Prophetess"? "Impetus"? "Profitless"? "Impotence"? "Pompous Ass"? "Pom-pom tits"? "Poconos"?
Release
The film had trouble getting a distributor after its festival run, as several other male-oriented romantic comedy films were complete around the same time. The TV seriesFriends had also aired by the time production completed.
Reception
reports that 17% of six critics gave the film a positive review; the average rating is 3.8/10. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times rated it 2/4 stars and wrote, "This is an overdirected and overedited film, in love with the technique of short cuts in which characters finish each other's sentences." John Anderson of the Los Angeles Times wrote that the film's premise is "ludicrous and perfect, since the film is basically about the uninvolving being obsessed with the uninteresting". Lawrence Van Gelder of The New York Times called it "a literate, funny film about men, women and the many mysteries of love in the 1990s". Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote that the film, like other romantic comedy films about men, uses a stock premise that is false: men do not understand what women want.
