Apatow films

Rating: 7/10 (19 December 2005)

The ending of this film totally ruins the experience. These guysThey like to have fun with film-making, singing stupid songs like "Afternoon Delight" in that scene from "Anchorman"; but that strategy won't work all the time. It doesn't work at all in the ending of "The 40 Year Old Virgin", a honestly made comedic film.
So about these guysJudd Apatow has a company that produces films, films like "Anchorman". I think the man is proposing a new way of real comedy, with intelligent humor. The intelligence sometimes ironically proposes that stupidity can be the correct way of making people laugh. Apatow knows this, and he knows the people that can achieve it.
"Anchorman" was written by director Adam McKay and star Will Ferrell. The cast included Paul Rudd, David Koechner and Steve Carell. Apatow produced Will Ferrell's recent "Kicking & Screaming"; gave Paul Rudd a role; lend David Koechner a cameo; and co-wrote with Steve Carell his first full-length feature, about a virgin with forty years.
Carell stars; he's becoming quite "the funny guy" these days. He produced this film, and it seems he wants to make a fool out of himself by playing the fool, but that's exactly the reason; because he knows he has a gift for absurd comedy and he knows he'll make us laugh out loud with character like Andy in a movie like this. It is called self-confidence, and it is a great and basic quality in a comedian.
I don't know any 40 year old man who's a virgin. I know adults that have their toys, adults that have their action figures, but no virgins. It is an issue, a serious one, and one that can be ridiculed in excess. Apatow and his partners deal with it truthfully, from the point of view of love relationships, making the ride very sincere.
Carell's Andy works with pals David (the always natural Paul Rudd), Jay (a funny Romany Malco), Cal (the very promising Seth Rogen) and the foreigner Mooj (Gerry Bednop), who always encourages people to have sex with a goat (situations that repeat constantly so we understand the film's language). Besides being 40, Andy's social situation is difficult.
When Cal talks to him about the weekend, he says he went to Tijuana and saw a woman having sex with a horse. "What did you do?", he asks Andy. "Well, I felt I really needed an egg sandwich, so I bought the egg and spent three and a half hours making the sandwich, but then I didn't feel like eating it; and I didn't even have bread". Cal pretends to shoot himself while Andy doesn't look.
These situations the virgin experiences with all his co-workers, developing a friendship that originally comes from their objective: getting this man in bed. Eventually Trish comes into his life. She's played convincingly by Catherine Keener, and has kids and Andy starts dealing with them, the relationship grows but with absolutely no sex involved. This is all very well written and is the best of the film; Andy's talks with Trish's daughter Marla (Kat Dennings) and ultimately a scene of a misunderstanding that delivers an unforgettable line, by an unimportant character: "Dude, teach me!" It's awesome.
The time will come for Andy to reveal the truth and you'll laugh constantly meanwhile, and in the end you'll realize that this is a good comedy of good intentions, that Judd Apatow is more a planner than a director (he directed correctly and simply an idea he wanted to develop), and that Steve Carell is a natural comedian; and he's got it going on.