DESPITE FLAWS, `BREAK-UP' HAS ITS MESSY CHARMS.

Byline: Glenn Whipp Film Critic

Some of the bad buzz surrounding the not-so-bad romantic war movie ``The Break-Up'' involves the general unpleasantness of the characters and their fractious relationship. People: The movie is titled ``The Break-Up.'' Not ``The Meet Cute'' or ``The Make-Up.''

Quite frankly, we've had enough of the latter kind of movies where a man and a woman hook up, separate, overcome some artificial obstacle and live happily ever after. In ``The Break-Up,'' we do see the characters played by Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston meet, and we relive their happy, kissy moments through the opening credits, set to Queen's ``You're My Best Friend.'' Then, 10 minutes into the movie, the insults start to fly.

The problem here is that the filmmakers (or, more likely, the studio execs) didn't have the courage to follow through on the film's ``War of the Roses'' premise. Rumor has it that they shot three endings for the movie. Audiences didn't like any of them, and rightly so. It's not the ending that's the issue. It's the movie's wobbly tone and its betrayal of its characters in the name of niceness that dooms ``The Break-Up'' into being a film that will satisfy no one -- not even the bottom-line thinkers.

The prickly pair consist of the doughy Gary (Vaughn), a me-first man-child whose favorite things in life are ESPN ``SportsCenter,'' video games, beer and ``SportsCenter,'' and the taut Brooke (Aniston), an old-money art dealer whose tastes run to the finer things in life.

Brooke's beef with Gary isn't so much that he won't accompany her to the ballet, though she'd like that. It's that she wants Gary to ``appreciate'' her, to ``give a (rip).''

Words are exchanged, and the relationship blows up in a way that, for all its stupidity, is totally believable. Gary and Brooke continue to share their Chicago condo, bringing about a series of madcap events in which Brooke tries to make Gary see what a good thing he has in her and Gary tries to show Brooke that she can be easily replaced by any old rent-a-hooker. This is not so believable.

And that duality keeps the movie from working. In between the kvetching and the hand-wringing, you've got turns from enjoyably oddball characters like Brooke's aggressively a cappella-singing brother (John Michael Higgins) and Gary's lunkhead bartender buddy (Jon Favreau, reuniting with Vaughn 10 years after ``Swingers'').

Others offering support include Ann-Margret, Vincent D'Onofrio, Judy Davis, Joey Lauren Adams and Cole Hauser, all playing remarkably detailed characters.

The attention to the cast and the world they inhabit isn't surprising, given that ``The Break-Up'' comes from Peyton Reed, a director gifted with a flair for visual filmmaking and offbeat storytelling. But between the supporting characters' broad antics, Aniston's moping, Vaughn's rat-a-tat-tat verbal workouts and the bickering between the leads, you have two or three different movies competing with each other.

Top that with the turn-on-a-dime rehabilitation of one character at the end and the movie's bullheaded insistence on fanning the audience's hopes that Gary and Brooke will somehow make it work, and you've got a mess. Not unwatchable. At times even enjoyable.

But a mess all the same.

Glenn Whipp, [phone].

glenn.whipp(at)dailynews.com

THE BREAK-UP - Two and one half stars

(PG-13: sexual content, nudity, language)

Starring: Vince Vaughn, Jennifer Aniston.

Director: Peyton Reed.

Running time: 1 hr. 45 min.

Playing: In wide release.

In a nutshell: ``War of the Roses''-style deconstruction of the romantic comedy that works in fits and starts, but ultimately collapses because it's really two or three different movies competing with each other.