I’m a fan of romantic comedies in general. Over the last several years, we – the collective twelve-bucks-a-pop-paying audience – have gotten the same thing over, and over, and over again. A predictable boy meets girl flick with the same characters, the same jokes, and the same happy sappy ending. It would appear that an ending powerful enough to give the viewer a tooth ache is necessary for films of this genre, but I don’t believe that is so. Crazy, Stupid, Love breaks out of the norm a bit. It is smart and clever and keeps us following right along until the very end. It has all of the necessary elements of a romcom, but a couple of added extras to sweeten the pot.
Steve Carell plays Cal. Cal is a very familiar character for Carell to play. He played variations of Cal in 40-Year-Old-Virgin, Date Night, and Dan in Real Life. The man who just can’t get life right. Cal is struggling with a failed marriage and what he did to let it go south. After finding out that wife Emily (Julianne Moore) has slept with someone else, Cal starts to do what anyone would do in that situation: sip watered down vodka-cranberries at a ritzy club that always seems to be crowded with gorgeous women. To make matters worse, Emily didn’t just sleep with some guy. She slept with David Lindhagen (Kevin Bacon). Anybody but Lindhagen.Read More »
Ms. Silver Screen 