A solid cast but a screenplay all over the place.

Rating: 6/10 (8 April 2015)

Crazy Stupid Love is a 2011 comedy that has some funny scenes, some clever dialogue, and a charismatic cast, but suffers from a rambling screenplay that tries to encompass a little too much and takes way too long to get where it's finally going.
The film stars Steve Carell as Cal Weaver, a man rocked by the announcement from his wife of 25 years, Emily (Julianne Moore) that she has slept with a co-worker and wants a divorce. From there, the story expands into so many unexpected directions that it becomes a little dizzying to keep track of everything that's going on. It begins when Cal begins getting advice on getting back into the dating scene from a player named Jacob (Ryan Gosling) whose interest in helping Cal doesn't really make any sense.
Jacob eventually gets involved with a woman (Emma Stone) who only shows interest in him after her co-worker/boyfriend (Josh Groban) breaks her heart. The story becomes even more complicated and murky as we finally learn who Stone's character is, but by this time, we really don't care because to be honest, Gosling has more chemistry with Carell than he does with Stone.
The storyline involving Cal's son and his babysitter also walks the fine line between good taste and perversion, despite a superb performance from Jacob Bobo as the boy. But what this film does contain at its heart is a vividly human performance from Steve Carell as Cal, an actor with a lovely Jack Lemmon-ish everyman quality whose mere presence on screen evokes immediate sympathy and the desire to put your arm around him and tell him that everything is going to be all right and he is well-matched by Moore, who brings a calming center to the insanity that is the rest of the proceedings here. The screenplay is well-intentioned but goes horribly off-course, despite an extremely likable cast.