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Digital REmix RECords August 7, 2011 -
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Originally, I had intended for this entry to be far longer, but seeing as how I made an epic-long intro for my non-film related blog [link='http://digitalremixrevolution.wordpress.com/2011/08/07/a-special-thanks-and-a-rather-overdue-entry/']here[/link], I hope that you all will find it in your hearts to forgive me this once for a mediocre review, as I am wiped out from spending roughly 4 hours on that blog entry I just linked.
So in brief, I will tell you my experiences with The Change-Up and Crazy, Stupid, Love.
I don't know what I was really expecting with The Change-Up. At this point, I had already seen Crazy, Stupid, Love, and it was highly possible that I was looking for a lot of quality comedy that I felt I had experienced in Crazy, Stupid, Love. Basically, I will have to admit that I may have placed my expectations just a little too high.
I would also like to mention that I found it rather ironic that I thought the trailer for The Change-Up had been hilarious while I found the trailer for Crazy, Stupid, Love to be quite awkward, and consequently I had had higher hopes for the former over the latter.
So imagine my surprise when I felt that Crazy, Stupid, Love actually blew me away to some degree, whereas I was thoroughly disgusted with The Change-Up. I felt like not even Ryan Reynolds' good looks and Olivia Wilde's charming acting could really save the movie as a whole, because the plot was just like a really messy scrapbook of various movies to me--like the authors took scraps of movies similar to Freaky Friday and Just My Luck and kind of threw it all together half-heartedly.
As for Crazy, Stupid, Love, well...for the most part, I find that I don't always agree with Rotten Tomatoes, but I couldn't help but check it for this movie because I found that although I wasn't all that charmed by Emma Stone and found her quite awkward in the trailer (in fact, the bit they cut of her for the trailer made the movie seem like it was going to be totally cringe-worthy), I couldn't help but feel a bit on the fence about the movie because of Steve Carell and Ryan Gosling, whom I both love for their respective roles in The 40-year-old Virgin and The Notebook. Upon looking at the reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, I couldn't help but be intrigued by (what I had thought at the time was) its unusually high rating, and decided that that was good enough for me to give the movie a try.
At first, I was a bit concerned because the movie was being shown in one of those "reject" theater rooms--I'm sure you know the ones I mean, the ones meant for the "dud" movies and don't really offer the best seating arrangement nor really provide enough seating for a more highly anticipated movie.
That worry quickly went away, however, because even just a few minutes in I found myself pleasantly surprised by how funny the movie was and how much funnier it really was in comparison to the trailer--which actually gave almost nothing away. And there was one part towards the end (which I will not spoil here because it is totally worth experiencing firsthand) that I found to be so hilarious I just couldn't stop laughing, and I think everyone else in the theater was having the same problem as me. In fact, the couple in front of me had been laughing so hard they were rocking violently in their seats. All in all a very satisfying comedy.
Now, normally I would rate movies in several aspects such as dialogue, chemistry between actors, general casting, cinematography and so forth, but when it comes to comedy I just base my rating on overall laugh factor and re-watchability. My thoughts on the two? Well for The Change-Up, some parts of it I found funny, but most of it I just found rather painful, and it was one of those movies where I wished that I just had the ability to fast forward through many of the scenes. Crazy, Stupid, Love, on the other hand, definitely won my comedy affections and I feel I could totally watch it again. In fact, I could probably even watch it again right now and still enjoy it as much as I did when I first watched it.
So what do I think overall? Here are my grades for the two movies. Based on all I've said so far, here is how I feel about them.
Crazy, Stupid, Love: B-, I would definitely watch this film again, but I don't know if it holds up so high as to make it a golden comedy in my book.
The Change-Up: F, for me personally, it was so bad, I don't think I would ever watch this again.
One last thing I want to say about Crazy, Stupid, Love though, before I call it a night. It wasn't all comedy; there were some serious and sweet moments too. There were also a few, what I like to call, "poor b**tard" moments in there too. If you watch it, you'll probably understand what I mean.
