In 2002 America, no one denies 54-year-olds the right to have wild sex, talk about it, and even get movies made about it. For all I know, this is Republican National Convention material by now. But writer/director Eric Schaeffer ("one of New York’s true independent film voices," says the film’s Web site) wants barriers to smash, so he fills Never Again with self-righteous defiance. Licensed by Schaeffer’s belief that he’s striking back at American culture for stigmatizing the middle-aged, Jill Clayburgh’s lovelorn divorcée acts like an insane idiot (pardon me, I meant "holy fool"), annoying a helpless beauty-salon customer with her steamy confidences and donning a strap-on dildo and knight’s armor to win and hold her man (Jeffrey Tambor), a commitment-phobic pianist who has an unlikely steady gig playing new-age muzak in a Greenwich Village jazz club.

It’s too bad the phrase "romantic comedy" serves today mainly to dignify soggy dating-ritual sit-coms like this. Followers of the recent progress of the genre won’t be shocked to learn that the cinematic interest of Never Again is sub-zero, its Venus-Mars profiling insulting, and its comedy of errors excruciating. (97 minutes)