Oddball blend of documentary and pseudodocumentary on the subject of love in general and its absence, in particular, from the life of comedienne Charlyne Yi. “It’s about I don’t believe in love,” she sums up the project with characteristic informality and infelicity. This absence might be more puzzling or alarming if the now twenty-three-year-old didn’t act like she were twelve and boys were frogs and snails and puppy-dog tails. The on-the-road, man-on-the-street interviews, in spots such as Las Vegas, Nashville, Lubbock, Amarillo, and Oklahoma City, would appear to be authentically documentary albeit triflingly anecdotal (the anecdotes occasionally illustrated with low-tech puppet re-enactments). On the other hand, Yi’s embryonic relationship with actor Michael Cera under the ever-present eye of the camera, although almost unbearably realistic in self-consciousness and awkwardness, is never really believable as cinéma vérité. They are good enough actors, or anyhow idiosyncratic enough, to create an illusion of reality; not enough to dispel the illusion. And while they each have their childlike charms, the unpersuasiveness deprives the spectator of a rooting interest. The fix is in. Directed by Nicholas Jasenovec, portrayed on screen by Jake Johnson. (2009) — Duncan Shepherd