Wry Comedy ‘Follow’ Plays Familiar Hand

“Follow the Bitch,” Julian Stone’s wry, low-low budget comedy of the sexes, takes its title from a poker game that’s a favorite among a group of L.A. thirtysomething guys who’ve been gathering every Friday night for 10 years for a card-playing marathon.

Everything starts out as usual with the men gathering at a comfortable second-floor apartment in one of those classic ‘20s Spanish stucco units off Fairfax. Then comes the depth charge: Andy (Dion Luther) announces he’s getting married. Before his pals have a chance to absorb this shocker, Andy, clearly having gotten carried away, casually adds that he’s invited a co-worker to come by for the game.

The co-worker is the unthinkable: a woman--and one who turns out to be a coolly elegant whiz-bang poker player, Liz (Melissa Lechner). Especially outraged by this one-two punch is the evening’s host, Bill (Ray Porter), a struggling writer already in a bad mood, having received notice of a rejected manuscript earlier in the day.

What Stone, in his first feature, has to say is familiar: that men are immature, that emancipated women who confidently command equality by the very strength of their presence can be indeed threatening--especially to male bonding, since men tend to be uneasy with intimacy (thus requiring poker games, sports events and the like to provide a pretext for gathering together in the first place).

You wonder about the source of Bill’s seemingly bottomless anger at women until Liz makes him realize that even though he tells us he does date--clearly none too successfully--he clings to the Friday night ritual gatherings as his only real source of warmth and affection. Unconsciously, he links the prospect of his pals marrying and even the mere unexpected presence of a woman with his fears of ending up alone and abandoned. Stone and his capable cast express all these observations and more with considerable humor and passion.

Perhaps the stage might be “Follow the Bitch’s” natural medium, but Stone and cameraman Joe Backes make it a real movie, well-paced, buoyant and easy. However, Stone’s own sensibility seems more attuned to expressing itself within the formulaic plotting and broad humor of TV sitcom. In any event, “Follow the Bitch,” an OK entertainment, is a good industry calling card for all concerned.

* MPAA rating: R, for language. Times guidelines: The language is strong but appropriate to the milieu.

‘Follow the Bitch’

Ray Porter: Bill

Melissa Lechner: Liz

Dion Luther: Andy

A Gurney Releasing presentation. Writer-director Julian Stone. Producer Brett Schlaman.Cinematographer Joe Backes. Costumes Barbara Inglehart. Score/sound design Dane Davis. Production design Rachel Kamerman. Running time: 1 hour, 27 minutes.

* Exclusively at the Monica 4-Plex, 1332 2nd St., Santa Monica, (310) 394-9741.