So, the generation that includes our older siblings has finally come up with something creative: mumblecore. The film movement is the voice of the homelier, semi-smart white people squeezed in between Millennials (Me and You and Everyone We Know) and Gen X (Winona Ryder, Douglas Copeland, et al.). The sub-genre is basically founded on a single tenet—everything on screen should be a mirror image of the viewer’s life, given that that viewer is white, 25-29, works a low-paying job, and laden with boring romantic troubles.

Example mumblecore film: Ugh, remember that one time my girlfriend drank that beer even though I asked her not to? We broke up six months later.

Mumblecore’s “greatest” hits are after the jump.

1) Flannel Pajamas, 2007

In this film, Weeds‘ Andy (Justin Kirk) is in the buff. Actually, average-attractive guys giving full frontal is vital to mumblecore films, and it happens in almost every singe one that I’ve seen. This is because when real people have sex, there is a penis involved (lesbians excluded)—only in Hollywood has the D been removed from the F-ing because it’s too taboo, and mumblecore is just like your life. And you have a penis.

The other thing I remember is some chick peeing in her bathtub while crying and mumbling “I’m so ashamed.” She couldn’t afford a toilet, I believe, was the significance, but refused to give up her NYC lifestyle/dreams, even though rent is like so high that she pees in the tub, blah blah blah, can’t you relate? Her and naked Andy eventually get bored of each other and (spoiler alert) break up. And that’s the whole movie. But the girl was so annoying, insecure and self-depricating (just like real insecure, self-depricating people) and peeing in her bathtub all the time, that I ended up laughing out loud in the theatre, only to discover that the film’s director was sitting in front of me! Which is fitting: mumblecore directors—they’re just like us!

2) In Search of the Midnight Kiss, 2008 (currently showing at IFC)

In this one, an Average Joe who just got out of a relationship with a girl he loved moves to L.A. but can’t sell his screenplay or even start it—just like you. He is pressured into perusing Craigslist to find a date for New Year’s. OMG! Craiglist! It’s like we’re celebrating the zeitgeist before the decade is even over. Taking a slight step back from the normal M.C. formula—which would have the dude meet nothing but sad older guys or ugly chicks on Craigslist—he meets a P.Y.T. who is just like Natalie Portman in Garden State, only quirkier! Can you imagine? They have some weird sort of connection and then nothing in his life is all that different but it’s one of those one crazy night films where that is all that he needed. We hope.

3) Nights and Weekends, 2008

As the follow-up to LOL (yep, that’s really what it’s called), Nights and Weekends was a recent SXSW smash. Nights and weekends, as we all know, is when cell phone calls are free. And if you were sort of poor and in a long distance relationship, then this would be especially meaningful for you, and such is the set-up for this snoozefest about average-looking people. The struggling, smart, pariah girlfriend lives in New York and her nice, normal guy boyfriend lives in Chicago (though even those descriptions express more personality than either of the characters), because mumblecore films can only take place in major American cities. But nobody can afford to live in those, so they all have super ugly apartments that make for drab sets. And it’s always raining and cold, ’cause real life is just like that—shitty, y’know? This one sort of redeems itself only after the couple breaks up, but its best moment is the one in which someone says something that isn’t mundane. Once. Throughout the whole film.

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The movement began openly, with Harvard student Andrew Bujalski’s promise to make movies about his pals, assuring that all of these characters are reflective of the directors and their friends. Each film overstates the importance of their relationships, which aren’t all that exciting. But they seem to do this out of a lack of anything else to care about, save trouble finding inspiration. But even lack of inspiration could be tackled in an inspired way (ie: Lost In Translation) if the films dared inject a little more life into themselves. But like the characters they depict, mumblecore movies lack any ambition or confidence.

Ultimately, in trying so hard to resemble “real life”—in a racist, culturally pretentious, and hetero-normative context, that is—mumblecore comes off as contrived. The “realistic” dialogue and improv acting, seeking to depict the everyday, produces the opposite effect, and the characters are more bland than their real world counterparts. In trying to be plausible and candid, the storylines become even less eventful than reality. The deluge of cultural references, the dingy apartment sets, and the perpetual backdrop of overcast skies create a world grayer and less interesting than the real one.

Is this what it’s like to be lost and bored at twenty-five? Surely better art could be made about such a time period if the directors would just say something. If this is supposed to echo the lives of the low-budget artists of the new millenium, then I suggest that they just sell out. Perhaps it would lead to more interesting stories and better looking people to write about.