The devil is in the details....and a sad stereotype.

Rating: 1/10 (22 December 2013)

SPOILERS I really wanted to like this movie, I like Joseph Gordon-Levitt as an actor, but before he writes anymore movies, he's got to read some literature and stop watching reality TV shows. Here's a hint--reality shows are not about reality, they're meant to shock you and make you laugh. Or just shock.
Where to begin? The "jersey shore" stereotype of of an Italian guy who likes to party and go to church? Confession every week and the only thing he confesses to is self gratification and sleeping out of wedlock, for which he receives "penance" of 10 Our Fathers and Hail Marys? REALLY? What time period is this set in? There are no more "confession booths"! Penance stopped being like that for over twenty or thirty years that I am aware of. It's more like "do something kind for someone" or volunteer. More practical if you know what I mean. Even if I was OK with the stereotype, it's a stereotype of Essex County, NJ (think Sopranos). And, Gandolfini needed an accent coach because he's from Bergen County and, we just don't speak that way. And none of them had that even remotely right, none of them. I wanted to like this movie, I really did. But the stereotypes are just so over the top. A religious Italian guy who has sex indiscriminately, rates girls on looks with his friends, watches porn after he has sex with a random girl, a loud father who constantly watches football (uh, no...not in MY family) the Italian mother who only wants the best for her son and grandchildren (yeah, OK), and the sister constantly on her cell phone, even at the dinner table (not in any Italian family I know, at least in NJ). The stereotype older woman (and I mean OLD, over 20 years older) who somehow understands him and teaches him what TRUE love is. I can allow the beautiful manipulative girlfriend who wants a "real man" whatever that's supposed to mean, but you just can't take ONE college course in any school in NJ. There is a minimum number of credits for being a part time student, and there are all the many fees involved that would not make it practical to take one course even if you could.
Mr. Gordon-Levitt would have better served himself if he wrote about a stereotype he did actually know, maybe a California type is so wrapped up in himself. I guess the think is, this stereotype could have been "living in LA" instead of NJ.
So, I guess the only people who enjoyed this movie were guys who masturbate to porn on their computers and think it is normal. And they enjoyed the ti-tty shots.