Glenn Ficarra and John Requa’s previous film, I Love You Phillip Morris, was one of the funniest and most moving romantic dramedy’s of the past few years, but went tragically underseen because it focused on a gay love story. Their follow up is a similarly heartfelt, but decidedly broader and more mainstream affair entitled Crazy, Stupid, Love. Juggling multiple love stories – not always successfully – is a film that is held aloft by a talented ensemble cast that the material doesn’t fully deserve; a cast that includes Steve Carrel, Julianne Moore, Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone. Still, despite rarely living up to the promise of those involved, Crazy, Stupid, Love still manages to satisfy as an entertaining, glossy and easily consumable work of commercial romanticism perfectly suited for couples of any age.
The biggest hindrance to Crazy, Stupid, Love is that attempts too much. Too many plot lines, too many romances, and as a result, none of them quite get the attention they deserve. For starters you’ve got Cal (Steve Carrel), a dweebish family man whose life is thrown into turmoil when his wife Emily (Julianne Moore) reveals she had an affair with a co-worker (Kevin Bacon) and wants a divorce. Drowning his sorrows in a trendy bar, Cal meets Jacob (Ryan Gosling), a charming ladies-man who takes pity on Cal’s sob story and decides to help get him back in the dating game, new attitude, wardrobe and all. Not long after, however, Jacob finds himself questioning his own outlook when he meets and starts to fall in love with spunky law student Hannah (Emma Stone). Then, running parallel to all this, we get the story of Cal and Emily’s thirteen year old son Robbie (Jonah Bobo), who harbours an unrequited crush on his seventeen year old babysitter Jessica (Analeigh Tipton), who herself harbours an unrequited crush on Cal.
While there is plenty to enjoy in all the different narrative threads, I can’t help but feel the film would have been better had it narrowed its focus to just Carrel, Moore, Gosling and Stone. The babysitter plotline, although funny, feels largely disconnected from the rest of what’s going on. Similarly, as much as I love both Marisa Tomei and Kevin Bacon, I’m not convinced their minor characters justified the time that was given to them. With trims such as these, Requa and Ficarra could have spent longer developing the key relationships – Moore and Carrel, Carrel and Gosling, Gosling and Stone – and given us a bit more to chew on. Stone especially doesn’t become an integral part of the film until far too late, and the head-over-heels romance between her and Ryan Gosling comes about too quickly to believe even with the pair’s considerable chemistry.
Nevertheless, the cast is unquestionably where the film makes up for most of its flaws. Steve Carrel pulls out a more restrained version of his normal awkward funny-guy shtick, blending goofy laughs with scenes of more weighted and melancholy drama. Julianne Moore is similarly strong, and although her character seemed at times a little thin, the film does well never making her the villain. Emma Stone – as previously mentioned – isn’t in the picture for nearly as long as I would have liked, but in the moments she does have she continues to prove herself as one of the most watchable young performers working today. Finally, Ryan Gosling is easily the films most valuable player; charming, funny and naturally talented, the film is always at its best when he is on the screen.
While far from a landmark effort in the careers of anyone involved, there is more than enough heart and humour in Crazy, Stupid, Love to make it worthwhile. A tender telephone call between Carrel and Moore is especially poignant, while the scene in which Stone attempts to seduce Gosling is the perfect combination of funny, sweet and sexy (I heard audible murmurs of appreciation from female audience members when Gosling popped his shirt off). The ending runs a little long, driving home the point that the cure to most of the films problems lay in the editing room, where at least ten to fifteen minutes could have, and should have been cut. But while the film is not quite as brisk and focused as it should be, the cast makes it funny and romantic enough.
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