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Possibly the BEST Apatow connected
film yet: Forgetting Sarah Marshall
by Christian De Matteo
Super
Rob Reilly, director-extrodinaire
and my good buddy, doesn't agree with me at all when
it comes to the issue I have with The 40-Year-Old
Virgin and Knocked Up. I believe, however,
that when he sees Forgetting Sarah Marshall, he'll
agree with me completely, because this time, an
Apatow production has nailed how to balance
comedy and real human sentiment. |
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The 40-Year-Old-Virgin, a movie I
greatly enjoyed, and Knocked Up, one I also enjoyed,
were excellent comedies, BUT, I thought, got too
serious for too long periods of time, thus slowing
down the film billed as a comedy. A real
comedy, not a gross-out comedy or a sex-comedy, but
a truly funny story about humans has to have some
serious moments, because all great laughs come out
of mocking the tragedies of daily life.
However, Apatow, in his continuing search for comic
perfection, tends to give his films a little too
free reign in mining those areas. As a result,
we get very funny comedies, that have several, long,
slow "touching" moments. I have never
crucified him or his compatriots for this, however,
because I see the genius of what they're doing and
always enjoy the end result of it. I own both
Knocked Up and The 40-Year-Old Virgin. But
they're not quite perfect. Superbad, thus far, had come the closest, making a
touching moment both touching and comedic with
drunken Michael Cera and drunken Johah Hill announce
there undying love for each other. This serves
as a perfect testimony to true friendship as well as
continuing the feel of the film as a comedy. |
DVD
(Unrated, Special Edition)
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Now, however, we have Forgetting
Sarah Marshall. This film, in my opinion, is
the crown jewel of the Apatow kingdom.
Directed wonderfully by debut director Nicholas
Stoller, Sarah Marshall is a deep, sympathetic
character-study about heartbreak, relationships and
roadblocks we as humans tend to through in our own
way over and over again. It is also, however,
a non-stop comedy. And much of the credit for
this goes to star and screenwriter Jason Segel.
This script is wonderful. I
can't remember the last time I laughed this hard and
this often in a movie theater, something those of
you who read me regularly will know I don't say very
often. I was actually complemented on my laugh
at the end of the movie by a fellow movie goer.
And the theater, mind you, was packed.
I had very high hopes based on the
previews for this film, and they were justified in
full, despite the fact, that two of my favorite
moments from the previews turned out not to be in
the movie at all ("You wanna pick out the outfit you
break up with me in?" is a brilliant line and yet
the scene worked without it just fine). The
movie continues to be hysterical through out,
without really ever resorting to set pieces (moments
that could be extracted as episodic moments that
stand on their own without the plot) and allowing
every character in the movie to develop fully.
This feels like the accomplishment of a
long-standing goal this teams other previous movies
got so close to completing but never quite did.
The movie accomplishes this a number
of ways. 1) It avoids as many cliches as it
possibly can, except one. That one is my one,
hesitant problem with the film. 2) It allows
all the characters to be real people and not
caricatures of people who might make certain scenes
work. This is particularly exemplified in the
case of the "Best Friend" role, being played by Bill
Hader as very real human being, who truly cares
about his step-brother, Jason Segel's Peter (which
we also see a lot of - HA!) but never resorts to
being merely "Best Friend" role guy. We
believe this relationship, this friendship and that
they are really both distinct individuals. 3)
Allowing side characters enough time to develop but
not take over the film and make it feel
scatter-shot. And 4) Making a romantic comedy
about real people and not the people who inhabit
romantic comedies. The only
mistake, in my opinion, made in the story is the
"Boy loses Girl" section that exists as the only
part of the entire film that feels like it was
included to fulfill some sort of formulaic
requirement. I understand why it happens, but
I can't help but thing that Jason Segel could have
come up with an alternative to get to his ending
that was as original and fresh feeling as the rest
of the movie. Does this ruin the film?
Not at all. It merely keeps it from being
perfect. And there's time for that.
Segel and Stoller should have a whole lot more
chances after this film. And they deserve them
all. To my mind, the
standard for perfect comedy is Trains, Planes and
Automobiles, which, I know is a high standard to
have. However, I can say about Forgetting
Sarah Marshall, that it falls only just short of
missing the mark, which, coming from me, is high,
high praise indeed. Forgetting Sarah Marshall
is so good, I almost didn't mind seeing full frontal
male nudity made up for by only a photograph of
photo-shopped breasts. Almost.
See this one with an audience or see
this one with a date. If neither of these are
options, see this one by yourself. No matter
how it happens, see this. Forgetting Sarah
Marshall is brilliant and hard-to-be-topped entrance
of Peter Segel and Nicholas Stoller into the world
of big-time big-screen comedy. I can't wait to
see what comes next. OH, AND
BY THE WAY... I almost forgot. I have never, ever,
ever enjoyed Mila Kunis as much as I did in this
movie. She is perfect. She plays her
character so wonderfully, you almost wonder why
Peter doesn't get over Sarah Marshall instantly and
just dedicate his life to Kunis' Rachel. She
is terrific. Just one more reason.... Go
buy your damn tickets. |
