already dated

Rating: 5/10 (28 December 2007)

A friend had just watched this and was reliving their favorite scenes a few days ago. I recall liking the movie but my response was continually, "I don't remember that scene... I don't remember that... or that..." I had vague positive feelings about it, but had forgotten the entire movie except the waxing sequence, and the "You know how I know you're gay" banter. Watching it tonight, I was really stunned at what a loose, aimless string of shock/humor/provocation it is. Like "There's Something about Mary," most of it's value was in seeing it the first week or two, in a packed theater, to laugh your ass off over things that were startling to see on the screen. There are laughs in it, but your interest is frequently lost in obviously extemporaneous dialog, and lots of padding.
Apatows comic style is the one-joke movie, and usually the joke is invoked by the title as in this and Knocked Up. His comedy doesn't revolve around plot, but language and observed behavior instead. There's nothing wrong with that and I'll be forever grateful to him for sparing us from asinine idea-comedies like "Click" with Adam Sandler. But in all his movies, the characters just kind of go through the motions once the premise is introduced. We all drank the Apatow Kool-aid but the moment is quickly passing. I'll be amazed if he has more than a year or two left in him. Maybe if he learns to recognize/produce a finished script.
Because Apatow mixes more sentimental urges with raunchy humor, people give him a pass, but all his movies include some really sappy crap. Steve Carell's magic tricks, action figures & the final musical number all make my butt tighten. At this point we still knew so little about Carell that we gave him the benefit of the doubt paying such a dork, because the movie was so edgy. But when you go on to make Evan Almighty in an effort to pander to the lowbrow, bottom-feeding religious dollar, you actually are a dork.