First there was 40-Year-Old Virgin, then Knocked Up and Superbad. So what more can Judd Apatow and his cast of characters do? Witness Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
After the back-to-back failures of Walk Hard and Drillbit Taylor, the Judd Apatow brand could use a bit of a boost and he’ll most likely get it, courtesy of this very funny romantic comedy, written by and starring one of Apatow’s regular players, Jason Segel. A veteran of Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared and currently one of the stars of CBS’s underrated sitcom How I Met Your Mother, Segel specializes in playing overly sensitive man-children who are completely at the mercy of the women in their lives. Forgetting Sarah Marshall opens with his newest alter ego Peter–an aspiring musician who earns his keep writing the music for a CSI-like television series–experiencing the worst break-up in the history of break-ups at the hands of actress girlfriend Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell a.k.a. Veronica Mars). How bad a break-up is it? Let’s just say it catches Peter with his pants down…literally. (I didn’t time it, but Segel may have set the record for longest full-frontal male nude scene in the history of mainstream Hollywood cinema.) Distraught, the poor guy heads off to a Hawaiian resort to recuperate. But guess what? His ex and her new rocker boyfriend (Russell Brand) are also vacationing there and can be seen canoodling all over the place. Enter Rachel (Mila Kunis, formerly of That ’70s Show), the gorgeous concierge who starts hanging with Peter, first out of pity and then because she genuinely likes him. Meanwhile, Peter finds the courage to move on with his life and finally finish the project he’s spent the past few years wrestling with: a musical version of Dracula with an all-puppet cast. (This seems like an opportune time to mention that Segel, a self-confessed Muppets fan, recently inked a contract to write a new Muppet movie.) Like The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up, Forgetting Sarah Marshall is a loose and somewhat rambling comedy. In fact, there were a few spots where I found myself wondering whether Segel and director Nicholas Stoller were actually working from a finished script or just making the whole thing up as they went along. I’m also not entirely certain that the film does right by its female characters, who seem to have no inner lives beyond their relationship to Peter. The fact that Kunis and Bell are so appealing in their respective roles makes the script’s shortcomings that much more pronounced. That said, Forgetting Sarah Marshall is frequently very funny and is a great showcase for Segel’s peculiar comic stylings. The movie’s ace in the hole though, may be Brand, who is absolutely hysterical as pompous British musician Aldous Snow. Any other leading man might worry about being upstaged, but Segel seems more than happy to cede the biggest laughs to his co-star. It’s hard to say if Sarah Marshall will hit the public’s comic sweet spot in the way Virgin, Knocked Up and Superbad did (particularly with the eagerly awaited Harold & Kumar sequel only one week away), but hopefully this isn’t the last we’ll see of Segel on the big screen.
Also In Theaters
The Forbidden Kingdom
Martial arts fans have been waiting for years to see Jackie Chan and Jet Li team up (or, you know, kick each other’s asses) onscreen, so it’s a shame that this momentous event finally happens in such a forgettable movie. The real crime of The Forbidden Kingdom is that Li and Chan aren’t the main stars of the picture–that honor, or if you prefer, curse, falls to 20-year-old actor Michael Angarano, who portrays an avid kung-fu flick viewer transported back in time to ancient China courtesy of a magical staff. There, he teams up with a drunk rascal (Chan) and a silent monk (Li) to return the staff to the Monkey King, who is in the clutches of an evil warlord. Although the fight scenes–particularly the one between Li and Chan–are entertaining, the plot, which borrows liberally from The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars, is tiresome and rife with cliches. Maybe some Hong Kong filmmaker can convince Li and Chan to team up again, this time for a real martial arts epic, instead of this watered-down American version.
88 Minutes
After spending two years on the shelf, this thriller is finally being dusted off and given a quick theatrical release before it inevitably turns up on late-night cable. Al Pacino plays a criminology professor who becomes the target of mysterious death threats, perhaps from a criminal he helped put away year ago. The O.C.‘s Benjamin McKenzie also turns up as one of Pacino’s students who may be hiding dark secrets of his own. Word of mouth on the film is so toxic, even Pacino’s family might not show up to see it.
Pathology
Here’s another movie that’s been sitting around for awhile. Pathology casts Heroes star Milo Ventimiglia and former Who’s the Boss actress Alyssa Milano as med students who enter into a dangerous competition to see who can pull off the perfect murder. Hmmm…sounds an awful lot like Flatliners, minus the mystical mumbo-jumbo. Does Kiefer Sutherland make a cameo?
