Nice cast, shame about the movie

Rating: 6/10 (11 August 2011)

I do my best to support my neighborhood, single-screen movie theaters, theaters such as the Vogue: they charge reduced admission for mid-week screenings, they don't run commercials, and they usually only make you sit through a couple of coming attractions. So when I saw the cast for this movie, I figured "what the heck, why not?". I suppose maybe I need to see more movies; this one seemed curiously under-baked to me. As I waited for the laughs to start, I found myself pondering random thoughts: cinematically, are noses as incompatible as Julianne Moore's as Steve Carrell's indicative of doomed relationships?; is there only the one bar in all of Los Angeles?; would the Giants line-up work better with Orlando Cabrera batting lead-off?; and is there a chance of my actually picking up Prince Fielder on a waiver claim in my fantasy baseball league? It's that kind of movie; the pace is somewhat leisurely. There are subtle rewards: the high school girl saying "my lips are *seal clapping*", which provided the only laugh for me (and made me want to listen to the Go-Go's), and seeing John Carroll Lynch (who I always think of as Norm Son-of-a Gunderson) in a movie is always rewarding. But for the most part, I fear that I'll remember this movie as a squandering of some very estimable acting talent; it's the only movie I can think of that has ever made Marisa Tomei seem ridiculous.