Bartender Alex (Justin Long) provides Gigi (Ginnifer Goodwin) with advice about dating and relationships in the dramedy He's Just Not That Into You. (Warner Bros. Pictures)

The new relationship dramedy He’s Just Not That Into You is based on a best-selling self-help book, which in turn was based on a single line of dialogue from a hugely popular episode of Sex and the City. If you were into that show, you know the genesis of those immortal words. Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) was obsessing over a man who wouldn’t come up to her apartment at the end of a date, when straight-talking Jack Berger (Carrie Bradshaw’s boyfriend, played by Ron Livingston) bluntly told her, “He’s just not that into you.” The line caught on as a pop phenomenon — a liberating dose of reality for women who over-analyze mixed messages from men who are unlikely to commit.

These 20- and 30-somethings are narcissists, their complaints about the opposite sex sound whiny and the whole thing is about as erotically charged as the prorogation of Parliament.

Having seen He’s Just Not That Into You, I question the wisdom of basing a 129-minute film on a six-word catch phrase. Don’t get me wrong, the movie tries hard to look good. It’s about the romantic tribulations of attractive people who live in beautiful apartments, all of whom are played by attractive actors. They have cool, “creative class” jobs, doing things like writing ad copy and teaching yoga. But after a few minutes, I realized that the film and I just didn’t connect. To borrow a term from the dating world, I just didn’t feel any chemistry. These 20- and 30-somethings are narcissists, their complaints about the opposite sex just sound whiny, and the whole thing is about as erotically charged as the prorogation of Parliament.

With no fewer than nine interconnected major characters, director Ken Kwapis seems inspired by infinitely superior ensemble pieces like Magnolia, Crash and especially Love, Actually. However, he’s not up to the task; there’s just way too much plot here, and the lumbering movie appears to have no idea what it wants to be.

Is it trying to be a broad comedy? It seems so, at times, whenever the dim and deluded Gigi (played by Ginnifer Goodwin) is on screen, swooning over Conor (Kevin Connolly), the real estate agent who won’t return her affections. Gigi gets brutally honest advice from Conor's friend, Alex (Justin Long), who struggles to boost her self-esteem. Drew Barrymore is also out for laughs as Mary, a straight employee at a Baltimore gay weekly who relies entirely on the internet to meet men. Dated lines like “MySpace is the new booty call” are presumably intended to be funny.

The other storylines take us into bleak, dysfunctional relationship territory; you could get whiplash from the film’s jarring tonal shifts. Janine (Jennifer Connelly) and Ben (Bradley Cooper) are married, but he’s having a torrid affair with the free-spirited Anna (Scarlett Johansson). Jennifer Aniston and Ben Affleck play Beth and Neil, a couple that’s been together for seven years. She desperately wants to get married, but he doesn’t. Horror of horrors, Beth is asked to be a bridesmaid at her sister’s wedding, where she’s subjected to indelicate taunts from a moronic cousin.

Free-spirited Anna (Scarlett Johansson) complicates matters when she has a torrid affair with a married man. (Warner Bros. Pictures)

The actors featured here are usually quite likeable, but they’re constricted by a slight script and Kwapis’ leaden direction. Affleck is so restrained, he still seems to be doing penance for Gigli. Cooper fails to convey any emotional depth as his character’s marriage disintegrates. And Johansson, so natural playing a similarly vampy type in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, delivers a surprisingly stilted performance.

Clearly, the filmmakers would love to snag a big part of the audience that made Sex and the City such a huge hit last spring. They’ve tried to stack the decks with similar subject matter, an abundance of stars and the book/catchphrase tie-in. But the film has none of Sex and the City’s style, charm or zingy dialogue.

The line “he’s just not that into you” had a huge impact on the small screen — and resonated in the culture — because it represented a perception-altering moment of recognition for Miranda and her peers. It completely burst her balloon of smug knowingness, and convinced her that despite an impressive formal education, she was totally clueless when it came to reading male behaviour.

When Gigi has her own “through the looking glass” moment, we just don’t care. It’s lazily tossed off, like so much in this script. Sex and the City certainly got bashed for its superficiality, romantic navel-gazing and hearty embrace of materialism. But hey, at least it had likeable characters you could empathize with — something that’s sadly missing with this sorry lot.

He's Just Not That Into You opens Feb. 6.

Greig Dymond writes about the arts for CBCNews.ca.