Paul Rudd as a leading man, at last!

Rating: 8/10 (30 August 2009)

While my search for a crystal ball as of yet still remains fruitless, I can't predict the future with hand-in-the-fire, steady-handed certainty and confidence, but I will tell you there's a 95% chance I'll declare this the most complete and consistently funny comedy of 2009 when the time for best-of lists rolls around the corner.
Before people get annoyed with the term ( too late?), ILYM is a "bromance"; the non-sexual love, well friendship, story between two men. Realtor Peter Klaven (Paul Rudd) is struck by a weird realization after proposing to his girlfriend Zooey (Rashida Jones): he's never had a best friend. He's never even had close male friends. He meets Sidney Fife (Jason Segel) at an open house and they hit it off immediately. Zooey begins to worry about the closeness and time consumption of the fellas' friendship and Peter's never learned how to talk or act around male friends. He constantly tries to force cool 'slang' into his vocabulary (he nicknames Sidney "City Slicher", in an unfortunate burst of spontaneity) and they jam together in a garage. Peter struggles to balance his new-found lost adolescence and his sense of responsibility in the weeks before his marriage.
I Love You, Man is 2009's "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" and proves the upward arch of mainstream comedy quality since "the 40-year old virgin", comedies with heart are taking over from misogynistic, gratuitously violent and inappropriately disgusting or dirty comedies.