Crazy, Stupid, LOVED IT!

Y'all gotta see "Crazy, Stupid, Love." this weekend when it comes out, because it's one of those rare gems that justify me having a watching-movies blog at all.  Michael & I saw it last night at an advance screening and it was wonderful beyond words. It opens with Julianne Moore telling Steve Carell she wants a divorce after 25 years of marriage, and from there the movie becomes a parallel affair: part bromance -- golden-abbed Ryan Gosling, who has never looked better, teaches frumpy grumpy Steve how to dress like a real suave gentleman and how to smooth talk beautiful model types into bed -- and part delicately constructed mosaic character study about various characters and their often cringe-inducing pratfalls as they navigate the titular realm and articulate matters of the heart.

Gosling's lothario finally falls for a classy lady, and Emma Stone plays the one woman who's apparently ever called this gorgeous dude out on his obvious bullshit. The pair have electric chemistry that's rare on-screen (though currently rivaled, in a faster-talking, definitively hipper Justin Timblerlake/Mila Kunis rom-com "Friends with Benefits," which is also very much worth seeing) and their intimate moments are true and alive. With this movie, Gosling expands his already impressive spread of proven acting chops to include not just man-child alcoholics and working class stoics but also light-fare leading man roles. He's completely irresistible, just as his character is supposed to be, and we are at a loss to compose ourselves while witnessing Gosling the rom-com charmer in action. Stone, meanwhile, is inarguably the most promising comedic actress of her generation, with "Easy A" already proving she can open and carry a breezy studio comedy and elevate the entire production to a higher level of respectability with her mere presence. Kevin Bacon, Marisa Tomei, and the great character actor John Carroll Lynch are also part of the "Crazy, Stupid" ensemble, which collectively delivers a fantastic performance that will be hard to ignore by the Screen Actors Guild and especially the classy-comedy-loving Hollywood Foreign Press, which hands out Golden Globes every year and will surely give this one some "Love" (Ha!) come awards season.

The entire film is staged rather brilliantly, with the three main stories all tightly connected yet never in a way that feels forced or overboard. In other words, this is "Love Actually" writ much, much smaller and less cheesily (word? no.). Besides the save-the-divorce storyline and the taming of the ladies man storyline, the third plot strand involves the separated parents' 13-year-old son (Jonah Bobo is the actor's name and I haven't seen such a standout child performance in some time...the entire cast of "Super 8" included, which is saying something) and his growing infatuation with the teenage babysitter who also happens to be yearning secretly for the poor kid's father.

The 17-year-old babysitter/middle-schooler tango is expertly rendered by screenwriter Dan Fogelman, who has written one of the year's best screenplay and was paid handsomely by Warner Bros. for it, too (reportedly $2.5 million, a handsome figure for any screenplay but especially nice to hear given that the movie is aimed at the rarely respected smart adult demographic). As a result of WB's apparent confidence in not just "Crazy, Stupid, Love." but Fogelman's sharp, unique writing chops in general, he's quickly become one of the best paid scribes in the business, banking lofty seven-figure sums for every script he sells, from the $3 million WB plopped down for Fogelman's John Lennon-never-died comedy "Imagine" to the recent bidding war for his untitled disgraced-politician-returns-to-hometown-to-rediscover-himself pitch (which has Tom Cruise attached and ultimately went to WB for $1.5 million, script-unseen) to next spring's currently filming Seth Rogen/Barbara Streisand (!!!!!!) road trip romp "My Mother's Curse." Fogelman is obviously my career role model, except for all those kiddie pic scripts he wrote on his way to the top.

The actress who plays the poor babysitter (Analeigh Tipton) was on "America's Next Top Model" a few seasons cycles back and has thankfully switched gears on her blossoming career path because the girl can act, really damn well. Her character is dealing with unwanted advances from the 13-year-old boy she's supposed to be surrogate parenting while lusting after the boy's actual parent, a schoolgirl crush that blows up in her face in an unforgettable third-act sequence that will probably become an touchstone in modern film history as one of those iconic movie moments the Zeitgeist never lets pop culture forget, like Meg Ryan faking an orgasm in a deli. This particular scene, which turns out not to be the film's climax at all despite its cavalcade of comic conflicts suddenly colliding at the most inopportune moment, precedes the sweeter, softer actual big finish and singularly exemplifies the exceptional craftsmanship and skillful comic sensibilities of both screenwriter Fogelman and the movie's pair of directors, Glenn Ficarra & John Requa. These two are the guys responsible for bringing "Bad Santa" (brilliant, though it takes multiple viewings to recognize the movie's sharpest edges) and "I Love You, Phillip Morris" to bear, the latter of which faced a particularly difficult road to theaters between its Sundance 2009 premiere and the quiet art house-only release it got last December. Both "Santa" and "Phillip Morris" are distinctively "edgy," by which I mean they were both sold using that adjective in concurrence with glimpses of justifications for their hard-R ratings and are remembered primarily by audiences as shockingly dark comedies.

So it comes as a great surprise that "Crazy, Stupid, Love." is neither shockingly dark nor remotely edgy, unless you consider a strangely punctuated, bracingly on-the-nose title the definition of edge. This movie is refreshingly straightforward yet uniquely complicated, an old-fashioned comedy for smart adults whose definition of "adult" is not synonymous with pie humping, explosive diarrhea or the repercussions of a bachelor party blackout. The script is expertly plotted and the characters come across as real people whose real behavior is really, really relatable, even when it's over-the-top and embarrassing. We've all been in love, and we've all been crazy and stupid because of its infuriating influence. I want to hate on this title with every ounce of my being, except those few ounces that have yet to become jaded and cynical and differentiate accuracy from pretense.

In any case, "Crazy, Stupid, Love." is as good as commercial comedies get, even with those commas and that period. It's a perfectly suitable title because that's exactly what the movie is all about and don't pretend for a second that you can't totally relate to being engulfed by that very thing. "Crazy" great, this is a perfect summer movie that with any justice will become a big fat hit when it opens this Friday, July 29. Don't be crazy; don't be stupid. GO SEE IT!!!