Monday, July 12, 2010

#21 - I Love You Man - 2009


I love you man was my 7th and final movie of Outrageous Comedy Week. This is one I really enjoyed for several different reasons. It was a perfect movie to watch to finish out my outrageous comedy week. It wasn't too long (only 104 minutes) and it did not have any dull parts. Below is my detailed review.

I love you Man stars Paul Rudd as Peter Klaven and Jason Segal as Sydney Fife. Rashida Jones plays Zooey Rice who is Peter's fiancée. Her best friend is Denise (Jaime Pressley) and her husband is Barry (Jon Favreau). Other notable actors in this film are JK Simmons, Andy Samberg, and Thomas Lennon. Although I don't necessarily agree that all the characters were needed for this film the individuals they got to play them were good.

I love you man is a story about a guy (Peter Flaven) who doesn't really have any guy friends and after proposing to his fiancée he searches for one and eventually finds one amid some pretty comical events. This movie starts out with Peter proposing to his fiancée. After learning the news she calls her friends while they are driving and unbeknownst to them her friends are all on speakerphone and speak candidly about Peter. Right off the bat Peter learns that women really do tell there women friends everything and I mean everything. haha. Zooey has all her friends over and after overhearing them all talk about how Peter doesn't have any friends and worrying about how the wedding party will look Peter understands he needs to find some guy friends and find them quickly.

In an attempt to have him hang out with some other guys Zooey's best friend Denise basically forces her husband Barry to invite him over for their poker nights. Lets just say things didn't go that well. Peter not only beat them in poker but after winning a beer drinking contest against Barry he threw up all over him and was asked not so politely to leave Barry's house. Lets just say Peter wouldn't be invited back to any Poker nights.


Peter decides to seek help from his gay brother Robbie (Samberg) and his mom Joyce (Jane Curtin) in attempting to find some male friends. His brother suggests a "man date" and sets him up on a date with the crazy guy from Superbad who hit Seth. This guy has a high pitchy voice and after attending a Galaxy soccer game with him Peter thanked his brother for setting him up with "elmo". It got worse though. His mom set him up on a dinner date with Doug (Thomas Lennon) which seemed to be going ok until at the end of the date Doug went in for a kiss, not a peck, a romantic kiss on the lips. Needless to say this ended Peter's man date with him.


Peter who is a real estate agent is selling Lou Ferringo's house complete with framed torn blue jean shorts and a life-size bodybuilding silver statue of Lou himself in the back yard. It is there that he meets Sydney Fife (Segal) who goes to lavish open houses to look for as he put it, "eligible divorcee's" and of course the food. After conversing with Peter and giving him a heads up on a potential buyer they exchange cards. In one of the many funny scenes Sydney actually points out that the potential buyer has to fart but is hiding it because he is with his girlfriend. He eventually lets one go and on the way out Sydney walks by and suggests it "smells like fart in here". Very funny stuff. The next day Peter calls Sydney and they start to hang out. First for a casual drink and fish taco's and then a jaunt (as Sydney would say) on the Venice boardwalk. Peter eventually goes to Sydney's house where he see's a creepy masturbation station but more so a guys dream bachelor pad filled with all kinds of musical instruments. As the guys get to know each other better they start to rock out together or as Peter calls it "slapping the bass". They are both huge Rush fans and have that in common so rocking out is a hobby the do together at Sydney's place.


In easily my favorite scene of the entire film and one of my favorite of this entire week Peter lets Zooey listen to Rush on itunes on his laptop since she had never heard of them. As the music starts he decides to put on an impromptu bass guitar performance for her while stating "slapping the bass" over and over. Absolutely hilarious scene and one I could watch over and over and over!! Since things are going so well with Peter and Sydney he invites them to the engagement party where we see a less than thrilled to be there, Barry with his wife Denise. Peter introduces Sydney to Zooey's other friend Hailey which eventually led to a double date on the golf course. Sydney has no interest in her but does it as a favor to Peter. The golf outing turns ugly with Hailey accidentally hitting Sydney in the shin and holding up the golfer's behind them. After golfing Sydney invites Peter to a Rush concert at the Avalon and since it is their HBO night Peter invites Zooey but it doesn't quite go as planned. Zooey is basically left out at the concert while Peter and Sydney rock it out and slap the bass all through the concert. It turns out Rush actually played a 1 hour set for the cast and crew of this film there at the Avalon. The Avalon is such a cool venue for concerts and easily one of the best I've ever been too!


As the film moves along Sydney goes with Peter tuxedo shopping and after some very funny poses Peter picks out his tux. While there Peter runs into Doug, the guy he went on a man date with earlier in the movie. Doug was none to pleased to see Peter there with another man and spewed out "this is a taste of betrayal, taste of betrayal you fucking whore". Another very funny scene. After tux shopping Sydney and Peter again take a stroll on the boardwalk this time seeing Lou Ferringo having lunch with Tevin, Peter's arrogant real estate co-worker who has been trying to get Peter to let him go half in on the Ferringo estate. Sydney freaks out and goes to attack Ferringo and obviously that doesn't end well for him as he ends up in a sleeper hold. The day only gets worse for Peter as he gets into an argument with Zooey. The next morning on his way to work Peter notices numerous billboards with his name and different poses advertising him as a real estate agent. Sydney earlier in the film had asked to borrow some money from Peter and it turns out he did so to purchase the billboard ad space and the poses Peter did at the tux shop were ones that he incorporated into the pictures. Peter was not happy about this and didn't see the bigger picture and went to Sydney's house to confront him. After arguing for a bit Peter suggested that he not come to his wedding and they spend some time apart.

Peter eventually makes up with Zooey and starts receiving tons of voicemails from people who saw his ad's. As the wedding approaches he still has not called Sydney and cleared the air with him but as Zooey watches him from her hotel bedroom on their wedding day she can tell Peter misses him and wanted him there. She makes a call to Sydney and asks him to come. Funny thing is Sydney was already on his moped dressed and all driving to the wedding. He gets there just in time and joins the wedding party that consisted of Lou Ferringo, Peters Dad and brother, Doug, the "elmo" speaking guy, and the old guy he met on friend finder. After a short "I love you" man sequence with quips and quotes being said back and fourth Peter eventually gets married to Zooey and all ends well in I love you man world!


There were many different reasons this film was great to me. First off it had Paul Rudd in it. Second Rudd's continued failed attempts to say cool quotes and lingo when speaking, usually at Sydney were so damn funny throughout. It is a testament to his acting how natural it seemed for him to act that out while it was comedic in every sense of the word. I really liked Rashida Jones in this film as well and haven't really seen her in anything else. I hope to see her in future films because she was great. I didn't necessarily feel that Andy Samberg's character was necessary in this film but it didn't ruin the parts he was in I just didn't see it as an added value to the film. Based on Rudd's excellent comedic performance in this film and a story that was entertaining and easy to follow I would give this film a firm A-!

No comments:

Post a Comment