Ed's Next Move (1996)

Eddie (Matt Ross), a nice guy from Wisconsin, moves to Manhattan but can't seem to hook into the mean, lean New York lifestyle. He's sweet, polite, a cornflower mensch; he has manners. But he's living in a city that's abandoned civility — if you treat people well, you're a sap — and when he tries to romance Lee (Callie Thorne), the morose cutie-pie who keeps crossing his path, he's so earnest she thinks he's an alien. Ed's Next Move, the first feature written and directed by John Walsh, is as generic in form as a previous (male) generation's autobiographical first novels. Yet there's real zest in the details — the haughtily obnoxious banter at an East Village party, Lee's folksinging gigs (she and her band could be the zombie children of Jonathan Richman). Ross, with his Danny Kaye eyes and Howdy Doody cheekbones, has a self-deprecating Midwest ardor that sneaks up on you. The breakout star, however, is Kevin Carroll as Ed's distracted lothario roommate. The grimace of horror that crosses his face when Ed tries to flatter a romantic prospect by telling her she's ''pleasant'' is New York cynicism at its blunt finest. B