Director: Judd Apatow
Cast: Paul Rudd, Leslie Mann, John Lithgow, Megan Fox
Have I Seen It Before: Nope.
Did I Like It: I’m not sure why I waited until I was 41 (or 41 1/2, technically, and even more technically eight hands and an extra finger and a thumb) to watch this one, but it seemed like there was something sort of ominous and defeatist about watching it in my thirties.
And that feeling was probably unwarranted. There are things about reaching your forties that are unavoidable, and most of them aren’t even that bad. I think middle age is probably mostly something of a cakewalk, as long as one doesn’t burn through money at a rate that might otherwise cause someone to become a ward of the state. If you’re like Pete (Rudd) and Debbie (Mann), the early portions of that fifth decade are a rapidly combusting race to becoming their own fathers (Lithgow, and Albert Brooks). If Apatow makes good on his threats and some of use feel compelled to sit through a This is 50, I’m assuming they’re going to have to mainain emotional distance and borrow money from Maude and Iris.
There’s no way to view the comedy as glutted in its runtime can be consistently satisfying. Write it up to too much praise over a short amount of time for Apatow, and so we’re subjected to a two-hour plus home movie. It’s occasionally funny, because it is made by funny people. But that doesn’t make a great comedy. A great comedy obscures the author to become something a little more in service of a story, and a little more in service of engendering the sympathy of the audience.
And, above all, it needs to be a lot funnier. Some chuckles over two-plus hours? Your average is way, way down.