By: Greg Payne
When I'm a famous screenwriter, I'm still going to watch movies. Particularly if those movies involve Ryan Gosling. I'm a big fan of the Gos, and not because of Remember the Titans. If you want the best of Ryan Gosling go see The Believer, Half Nelson, Lars and the Real Girl, Blue Valentine, Drive, The Ides of March and Crazy, Stupid, Love.
My buddy Lee tweeted the other day that Crazy, Stupid, Love is underrated, and I agree with him. Not only underrated, but under appreciated. It debuted in July of 2011, at a point during the summer movie season when we had already suffered through disappointing comedies like The Hangover: Part II, Bad Teacher, Friends with Benefits, and Horrible Bosses, so we might have been burnt out on the wannabe laughers. These other four earned hard R-ratings, while CSL came in at PG-13, and proved that a solid script, a handful of subtle but hilarious lines, and some great performances can outdo the raunchiness and perverseness of those other efforts. That's not to dismiss R-rated efforts. Sign me up for Superbad, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, I Love You, Man, and The 40-Year Old Virgin any day of the week.
CSL earned a 78% Fresh approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes -- a very solid, and I would say, accurate number. There's a lot to love about CSL, namely the relationship between Ryan Gosling and Steve Carell. It's fun watching Ryan Gosling act like the man every woman wants him to be -- the handsome, cut up, smooth-talking ladies man. It's fun watching Ryan Gosling and Steve Carell meet at the mall to go shopping. It's even fun watching them sit at a bar, bantering back and forth. As a matter of fact, it's often more fun watching them talk about breakdance fighting and Mr. Miyagi than it is watching either one of them pick up one of the women in the bar. The two share a great comedic chemistry -- they're very easygoing around each other, and that makes them easy and satisfying to watch.
There's also the dynamic between Gosling and the wonderful Emma Stone, who cannot appear in enough movies, in this writer's opinion. It begins with a sharply written and very well-delivered scene in a bar, with Gosling resorting to courtroom terminology to try and pick up Stone, a lawyer-to-be. As much fun as this scene was, these two later steal the movie when Stone finally breaks it off with her loser lawyer boyfriend once he fails to propose, throws herself at Gosling in the same bar as before, and actually invites him back to his place.
Once at his place we see Gosling's character, Jacob, finally break down his steely, smooth-talking guy armor and we see a genuinely nice person. He takes off his shirt to reveal a so-so physique, he picks up Stone's character, Hannah, the way Patrick Swayze picks up Jennifer Grey in Dirty Dancing, and then they retreat to the bedroom. But they don't have sex and we're all better off for it, because they do first what people who actually like one another do: They talk. They talk about goofy things, like Brookstone devices and the home shopping channel, genuinely enjoying one another's company. And since this movie is a romantic comedy, the audience is meant to enjoy this better than a graphic sex scene, because it's the opening stages of a new romance when everything is fresh and exciting. We all know that feeling and we all like that feeling. They feel good, we feel good. Oh, the power of movies.
Julianne Moore, another terrific actress, is also in this flick, and the scenes between her and Steve Carell really are a more adult version of the ones between Gosling and Stone. When they're sitting in the school hallway, waiting to talk to Robbie's teacher, there are a host of witty lines, and there's an undeniable sweetness later on, when Carell is sorta creepily and secretly trying to take care of the backyard and she calls him and pretends to be fixing something in the basement, but really she just wants to talk to him and hear his voice because she misses him.
These four really drive the movie, but it definitely lags when they aren't on screen. Robbie, their son, is frustratingly annoying. I'm not bashing Jonah Bobo, the actor, but the role he was given. The movie really is well-written, but it's cringe inducing at times when the word "soulmate" gets tossed around, particularly by Robbie. CSL really does strike a nice balance between being a funny and genuinely sweet romantic comedy, but it gets too sentimental when the 'S' word becomes the basis of the relationships between several key characters. It's just one of those words that really can't be delivered well by any actor, unless it's being used in a sarcastic or drawn out tone. When it's meant to be used within the context of its actual meaning, it always comes across as too sappy.
Robbie might not win the award for most annoying character, though. That might go to his teacher, the five-years sober Ms. Taffety, played by Marisa Tomei. I really like Marisa Tomei. She's a fine actress. But a fine character Ms. Taffety is not. She doesn't speak. She squeals. And yells. And squeals some more. As at ease as the scenes between Gosling and Carell are, the ones between Carell and Tomei are borderline uncomfortable. She's the first girl he successfully picks up at the bar, and when they get back to his place she's just waaaaay too over-the-top. She might not be an alcoholic, but she's clearly addicted to crack the way she tosses her leg up on the table and perks up like a beaver seeing a well-built dam when Carell tells her he wants to show her off to his ex-wife. Much like Robbie, it was a good enough casting choice, but a very obnoxious character.
My other big criticism of Crazy, Stupid, Love is this, and it's not even an actual fault of the movie: How the hell can Ryan Gosling and Steve Carell afford to pick up so many girls at the same bar and not run into any of them ever again on a different night? Because you know that all of the women Ryan Gosling takes home in the film absolute love him and want to marry him, yet he doesn't have repeat dates or hookups with any of them. You're telling me they're all okay with this? You're telling me he banged Girl A on a Wednesday and never saw Girl A at that bar again? What about Girl B or C or D or every other letter of the alphabet? Gosling's the only repeat drinker at that watering hole? There's no way there wasn't at least one of those hookups that blew up in his face. It's pretty much irrelevant to the plot of the movie, but I guess my warning to my male readers is this: Don't always go to the same bar the way Ryan Gosling does. Life isn't a movie and you will see the same girls you once hooked up with again and they will dump drinks on you in front of the new girl you're trying to pick up.
If only we could all be Ryan Gosling from Crazy, Stupid, Love...
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