This may be 40 but I need to pee...

This is 40

       I like Judd Apatow. I do. His movies are smart, his humor is often hilarious and he has an insight into human life that many writers/directors simply don't have. He is by far one of the voices of this generation of adults. All of his movies combine the right amount of humor and drama to make you feel as though you've had a complete movie experience. I walk out of a Judd Apatow movie with a sense that I was not talked down to for 2 hours but was treated as an equal. I feel as though the movie echoes everyday life instead of a made up world of impossibly attractive people. So I do love Judd Apatow (Freaks and Geeks is probably as influential to my generation as John Hughes was to my brother's).  I just wish that he had a movie in him that could be under 2 hours.  Funny People is 146 minutes, Knocked Up is only 129 minutes and his best movie The 40 Year Old Virgin is the shortest at 116. His latest This is 40 runs at robust 134 minutes and easily could have been about 40 minutes shorter. It is one thing to have something valid to say and having it take 2+ hours but movies recently have taken busting the 2 hour mark as some sort of goal to be admired or some sign that their movie not the 90 minute one is more valid. Much like the penis, length is not the end all be all on how good you are.

     This is 40 is a sort of sequel to Knocked Up in so much as the characters played by Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann are the same characters they played in that movie. Both are now turning 40 and Leslie Mann’s Debbie is beginning to question her decisions in life. She feels unattractive to her husband who uses erectile disfunction medication to have sex with her, her store is missing 12,000 dollars and she is turning 40. Apparently 40 is the magic number by which people turn back into pumpkins. You need to have everything in line. A solid future, eating healthier and kids that want to spend time with you. Pete (Paul Rudd) is not having an easy go of it either. His father mooches off him and Debbie to the tune of about 80,0000 dollars, his indie record label is failing and he may have to sell the house just to keep out of debt. All of these things he has not told his wife.

     There is a lot going on but the soul of this movie is when they  follow immediate family. When the movie focuses on Debbie and Pete and their two daughters Sadie and Charlotte (played by Apatow and Mann’s own children Maude and Iris), the movie is at it’s funniest. When the movie includes Pete’s dad (Albert Brooks playing Albert Brooks) or Debbie’s father (John Lithgow playing a uptight spinal surgeon and absent father), the movie bogs down and I begin to wonder why we are there. It isn’t a condemnation of the actors, they do a game job of making their specific part work. Is Albert Brooks character aware that he is an ass? Does John Lithgow’s Oliver actually care that he barely knows his daughter? Who cares?

       I loved the scenes in which the family argued over their use of technology. May it be Sadie trying to finish Lost so she can know why they were on the island to Charlotte just wanting her teenage sister to want to be around her or when Pete hides in the bathroom to play Scrabble on his IPad. They obviously love each other but they never seem to tell each other. Pete and Debbie fight constantly and only seem to be truly happy when they can get alone time with each other on a weekend away. The truth is that if the movie could have focused on the 4 person family and a few of their friends, it would have been a tighter, more insightful look at turning 40. Why do I care if Megan Fox is hot and having sex in Debbie’s store during store hours? Why do I want to follow Pete’s lame attempt to make a 60’s rocker relevant in today’s world? 

This is 40 makes some smart observations about married life and the idea that turning 40 is when you begin the long slide to death. The movie tells you a lot about how you love your kids and how they in turn love you. It is a good comedy that keeps you laughing throughout but maybe has a few too many dry spells in between the laughs. Towards the end, I was so bent on climbing over my friends to get to the bathroom that I didn’t get to enjoy the movies climax which never really seemed to solve any of Debbie and Pete’s issues and instead ended because they realized they were 2 hours and 15 minutes into a story and it needed to end someway. There is very little I enjoy more than a good ending and This is 40 just finishes. Life goes on and perhaps that was the point. To make the film be speak to real life. I just wish it could have said it faster.

Mr. Unhappy Sez: With 40 minutes less and a few less plot lines, this movie could have been insightful, smart, funny and enjoyable. Of course maybe that is just my bladder talking.