Judd Apatow‘s This is 40 is a foul-mouthed comedy that wants to be a drama, but is really just a mess. The comedy within only seems to exist out of a lack of storytelling tact. That, and to make up for the cynical and mean-spirited nature of the stunted narrative, which would be better served as a sitcom with a laugh track than a feature film. Each scene seems more interested in telling jokes than advancing the story, a story that is often left behind, with elements dropped for such lengthy periods of time you can’t tell if anything is meant to be important.
Billed as a film that is relatable to the masses, I guess that is true when you consider the story focuses on growing up, getting older and dealing with it. But there are a few loopholes you’ll have to jump through before you find kinship with Pete and Debbie (Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann), two characters first introduced to us in Apatow’s Knocked Up and spun-off into this quasi-sequel.
In terms of relatability, Pete and Debbie could be like any one of us, if we were married with two kids, a large home, a pool in the backyard, two nice cars and owned an independent record label and our own clothing boutique. I mean, we’re talking middle class America right here aren’t we. Yet, the demographics are hardly this film’s problem, but the problems that result out of their lifestyle certainly are.
Pete’s record label is facing financial ruin and Debbie is left to wonder which one of her employees has been stealing from her. These concerns, however, don’t seem to be that big of an issue considering they are either abandoned or turned into punchlines throughout, so let’s see what else is causing friction in the household.
Of course, there is the title. Both Debbie and Pete are turning 40, though Debbie is having a harder time with it than Pete and the situation around her isn’t making matters any easier as she is left to deal with her eldest daughter becoming a young woman and her youngest in crisis because she’s losing her older sister. Meanwhile, money is tight not only due to Pete’s suffering business, but because he’s been loaning upwards of $80,000 to his father (Albert Brooks). Again, we all have that kind of money just to hand out don’t we?
Speaking of parental issues, Pete obviously has his problems with his mooching father, but Debbie hasn’t seen her father (John Lithgow) in years as it would appear he has little to no interest in her life and hasn’t even seen his grandchildren since they were babies. Suffice to say, life is a mess to the point Debbie is chewing out her eldest daughter’s classmates out of frustration and even though they have no money, Pete and Debbie’s delirium leads them to take an expensive vacation to a spa where they indulge themselves, enjoy pot brownies and discuss the ways in which they’ve actually considered killing one another. Nothing like a little time away.
Whether any of this sounds good or terrible to you, one thing to note is all of it could have worked. Unfortunately, Apatow destroys any chance for narrative cohesion due to a lack of understanding what it means to be a dramatic storyteller, by relying so heavily on comedy and punchlines rather than the ins and outs of the story. Pete’s business troubles often pop up out of nowhere and when they do they are handled with jokes, an incompetent group of employees and bad decisions. After that, it’s on to the next problem facing the couple, all told in the same manner and never once do you feel as if any of this could end badly.
There is never any question how this film will end, it’s only a matter of how many ridiculous situations and cameo appearances can be tossed in before it does. Melissa McCarthy gets a chance to unload a slew of insults in a brief principal’s office scene (which is touched upon again in a series of outtakes during the end credits). Megan Fox plays one of Debbie’s employees and is given the chance to be seen having sex in the store during working hours (Debbie’s fine with that by the way), offers up her breasts to give Debbie a feel and then there’s an awkward pool scene where Jason Segal and Chris O’Dowd chase Fox all around the water during Pete’s birthday party. And don’t even get me started on the random Charlyne Yi inexplicable Exorcist moment.
Some of these scenes are funny, but they’re funny in the way a long-running joke on “Saturday Night Live” is funny. They’re one-offs that don’t serve a larger purpose outside of being funny for a minute and this film is almost comprised entirely of these kinds of scenes.
There is no glue keeping this film together, though once you get to the final scene you’d think you just saw some sort of thoughtful dramatic look at surviving a middle-age crisis. Yet, even the ending passes the buck, though its lack of an emotional climax may be the most honest moment of the entire film, but even then it relies on unearned schmaltz.
This is 40 is lazy storytelling where nothing feels authentic and the only realization coming out of it is Apatow’s lack of maturity and inability to say something real without layering on swear words and ridiculous scenarios.
