If you're a fan of mild-mannered dramedies about small-town life, you could do a lot worse than Diggers. Scripted by television actor Ken Marino -- he also plays the main dramatic role and plays it well -- the film centers on the trials and tribulations of a community of blue-collar clam-diggers in mid-70s Long Island. There's a big corporate entity that is moving in on the island and intends to squeeze the locals out of the clam business once and for all. Some of them, like Hunt (Paul Rudd) are thinking of shaking up their lives, trying their luck in the big city and starting new relationships, while others like Lozo (Marino) are reluctant to embrace any kind of change, small or large. Lozo is such a traditionalist, in fact, that his old-fashioned view of the world ends up setting the stage for the film's most effective scene, a confrontation with his wife over her desire to end a pregnancy she doesn't want. Women's rights and Jaws references -- this is a film 70s-lovers can really warm to.

Maura Tierney, most known from TV's ER, plays Gina, the central female character. She's a sister to Hunt and love interest to a local do-nothing called Jack (Ron Eldard) and is a general anchor-character of the story -- one that all the other characters sort of swirl around. In fact, one of the things Diggers usually does well is to make most of the significant characters seem like they are the central character whenever its time for their story to kick into gear. A lot of thought clearly went into the film's structuring, which is refreshing. The mixture of comedy and drama is a little more uncertain, though -- some scenes feel like the script said 'comedic hijinks ensue at this point' and the actors sort of had to wing it. The comedy gets a little too physical for my taste. Marino has certainly shown here that he has the chops to write a real story with real dramatic and comedic moments, and the film would have benefitted by leaving some of the artificial comedy on the cutting room floor.

Such is this business that sometimes you see the movie before you see the preview. I saw Diggers at a screening a few days ago, and now the trailer has popped up over at Moviefone. I can tell you that the trailer is a pretty fair representation of the film, which is about a bunch of clam diggers in mid-70s Long Island, who struggle with life, love and dreams of moving away to the big city. There's a pretty even balance between humor and drama, as the trailer depicts, but the one thing that struck me as odd -- I'll be writing about this in my review of the film as well -- is that even though Lauren Ambrose of Six Feet Under fame is second-billed in the trailer and touted as the film's leading lady, she has only a few, truncated scenes and her character has substantially less time than the other players. As a fan of her work, that was a little disappointing.

Aside from Ambrose, the main players are Paul Rudd and Maura Tierney as a brother and sister who just lost their lifelong clam-digger father, Ron Eldard as a comedic lowlife who is trying to date Maura Tierney and Ken Marino as a hothead father who struggles with whether or not he should give in to the corporate bad guys who are trying to take over his territory. Marino has a couple of knockout scenes, and overall I'd say his role is the cherry of the bunch and could propel him into more substantial acting roles after this. There's also a good gag in the film about Jaws still playing in theaters -- I believe it takes place in September 1976 -- but was Jaws really still in theaters, even with the old releasing style, over a year after it opened? I wonder. Anyway, Diggers is scheduled to drop on April 27.

If I described Diggers as being about "four old friends who struggle to (finally) mature in the face of grown-up stresses, miseries and generally unpleasant turns of event," you'd probably respond with something like "Oh yeah, just like 45% of all indie/comedy/dramas I've seen this decade." And you'd be right -- it's not a stunning sense of originality that makes Diggers worth watching; it's the actors, combined with the asset of a surprisingly insightful screenplay that does the job. It's amusing to note that while screenwriter Ken Marino's old State-mates are out banking huge coin writing chaff like Let's Go to Prison and Herbie: Fully Loaded, his first screenplay is a much more personal and low-key affair.

While Diggers would most likely be labeled a "drama," the truth is that there's a lot of solid wit to be found here. It's just couched in between a lot of (surprisingly compelling) melodrama, which helps the 'funny bits' to succeed more often. Plus, Diggers is packed with really strong performances, particularly from likable folks like Paul Rudd, Lauren Ambrose, Sarah Paulson, Josh Hamilton, Maura Tierney and Ron Eldard. Marino gives himself a very juicy central role, but the guy manages to steal every scene he's in, so it's not like it's a bad thing. (His scenes with Ms. Paulson are really quite excellent.) Rudd, Eldard, Hamilton and Marino make for a quietly compelling quartet of old pals; the guys exhibit a clear and casual chemistry that helps the semi-familiar material go down a lot more smoothly.