Her night changes with the arrival of Matt Firenze (Ethan Embry), a 30 year-old pizza delivery guy. He sees what’s going on and feels kind of sorry for the girl. When she begs him to let her ride along for an evening’s worth of deliveries, he agrees. The next few hours change both their lives, as Cara-Ethyl fulfills some personal goals and learns self-respect, and Matt faces some uncomfortable truths about his dead-end life.

What Pizza has going for it is a solid performance from Embry, who has brought a likeability to films such as Can’t Hardly Wait, That Thing You Do! and even Vegas Vacation. The actor shows us several dimensions to Matt, making us feel that he’s a guy trying to hide his pain in a façade of nonchalance. It’s an interesting character, well-played. To her credit, Sparks (a former “ER” guest star) believably makes Cara-Ethyl a weird outcast, and we can understand why nobody likes her. Then again, that may not be such a great thing for the audience.

The movie may have interest for some viewers. In addition to Embry’s fine work, there are certainly a few laugh-out-loud moments along the way, and a couple of scenes play out to effectively show how Cara-Ethyl’s low self-esteem impacts her life. But for me, Pizza was a little too precious. For starters, the characters in this movie don’t talk like real people; they all talk like overly clever screenwriters. The dialogue never rings true because it’s always full of the stylized witticism of a screenplay that’s trying to be funny.

The relationship between Matt and Cara-Ethyl is also less than convincing. We’re supposed to believe that a night of outrageous events – seeing a naked man, sneaking into a club, baking a pizza that will cause Cara-Ethyl’s enemies to have uncontrollable flatulence when they eat it – creates a strong bond the characters. In truth, they bond because the script forces them to. I didn’t buy it for a second.

I think that writer/director Mark Christopher (54) had an interesting idea here, but he didn’t believe in the reality of it. The film often feels like an extended sitcom rather than a full-length motion picture. I wish it had taken a more in-depth approach at exploring the lives of Cara-Ethyl and Matt. There’s potentially something meaningful there; Pizza just doesn’t quite find it.

( 1/2 out of four)

Pizza is rated PG-13 for sexual content, language and a brief drug reference. The running time is 1 hour and 22 minutes.