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As we approach the end of August, as always, when it comes to new movie releases it seems they're scraping the bottom of the barrel. The latest is a comedy called "Swinging With The Finkels."

Mandy Moore and Martin Freeman are a married couple who are experiencing the seven year itch. Their love life has become quite dull, so Moore suggests the following plan to spice things up: swing with another couple.

The interview process for prospective couples is supposed to be amusing, but like everything else in this movie it's not.

Writer, director Jonathan Newman has no idea what funny is. His gags are tasteless, humorless, predictable and tiring. Nothing works here. The casting is terrible as Moore and Freeman are tremendously mismatched.

Moore is not engaging and Freeman, who apparently has a bigger career in the UK than he does in the U.S., is simply awful and has no comedic timing.

Other people who crop up in this fiasco are Jonathan Silverman, as Freeman's best friend and Jerry Stiller as Moore's dad.

I can't imagine that the pay day on a small movie like this was that great, so why these people agreed to do this film, is beyond me. As they recited insipid dialogue and acted in scenes that were in really bad taste I was actually embarrassed for them.

Making matters worse, halfway through, the movie switches gears and attempts to be sentimental, examining the joys and loss of marriage. That tact doesn't work at all either.

Low brow comedy can be hilarious if the filmmaker knows what he's doing. Clearly this writer/director, with his stale, hackneyed jokes, is at a loss.

I'm shocked that this movie, which opens next week, even got a theatrical release and didn't go straight to DVD. Even more amazing is that it got made in the first place.

Neil Rosen's Big Apple Rating: 1/2 Apple