If you don't recognize the title, you probably remember that this is the Vaughn-Aniston comedy.

Although The Break-Up was a solid hit, critics had a lot of trouble with this film, perhaps because it is a very difficult one to pigeonhole. Given the stars, one expects either a traditional romantic comedy or an edgy black comedy about a disintegrating romance, ala The War of the Roses. In fact it is neither, and it would disappoint people expecting either.

• If you expect something like The War of the Roses, a black comedy which serves as a vehicle for two hours of Vince Vaughn riffs, you'll be disappointed to see that Vaughn doesn't actually clown around much, and that the situations portrayed in the film are actually quite realistic rather than comically exaggerated. The good news, at least for me, is that The Break-Up doesn't have an ugly underlying tone like The War of the Roses. Sometimes it is sweet, sometimes mean, sometimes ugly, sometimes funny, sometimes sad. I suppose it's a lot like real break-ups.

• If you hope for a rom-com, you'll find that this film is neither very funny nor very romantic, and unlike mainstream rom-coms, includes neither a fairy-tale atmosphere nor a happy ending. It portrays the way people really behave in these sorts of tense situations when a love once new has grown old and may not survive. It's actually kind of close to the romantic comedy formula, and could have been converted to a traditional romantic comedy with some minor tweaking and a happy ending, but that's not where the creative team wanted to go with the film.

What kind of movie is it then? It is basically a romantic drama which presents a very realistic look at a break-up. The parties end their sexual relationship but are forced to live together until they can dispose of their condo. The play the same game of pull-me-close, push-me-away that good people often play in this sort of difficult situation. Will they get back together? Are they breaking up because they want to break up, or are they using the break-up as a tool to alter the other's behavior? Frustratingly, at least for me, they never seem to be ready to forgive one another at the same time. She finally makes a conciliatory overture and he misunderstands it. Then he makes one, and she has changed her mind about reconciliation.

It does have some good humor in it, but the jokes occur naturally within the context of the characters. Vaughn plays a witty Chicago tour guide whose bus and boat tours always have a waiting line because he does some funny schtick while he's describing the sights. The character's profession allows Vaughn to be very funny while his character is working, and since the character is a quick-witted guy, some of that carries over to the rest of his life as well. But most of the time he is engaged in serious, even contemplative discussions about what is going wrong in his life, or various schemes directed against his ex-. After several false starts, he finally gains enough self-awareness to realize that the intense emotional impact of the break-up is a wake-up call for him, a chance to be less jaded and self-centered. By the end of the film he is actively trying to make himself into a better person. In other words, this is a surprisingly sincere film about people like those we know, perhaps like ourselves, caught in uncomfortable situations we are all too familiar with. We identify with the couple and hope they can work it out, but like the Cub fans portrayed by Vaughn's crowd in this film, we realize that we may be backing a loser.

It's not a mean-spirited film, as some critics suggested, but it does have long stretches without laughs and, if you react as I did, it will leave you feeling ... well ... sad. I was pleasantly surprised to see Aniston and Vaughn give believable performances in multi-dimensional roles which were credibly written. In fact, this a very competent film in many ways, and the DVD has plenty of extra features and additional footage, but film appreciation is all about expectations, isn't it? People just don't expect to leave a Vince Vaughn film with a wistful tear in their eye.