Just like love in its beautiful blossoming beginnings, "Crazy, Stupid, Love." makes you fall hard at first, but then as things start to get familiar, it becomes predictable, messy, overly complicated and, well, crazy stupid.
Steve Carell stars as Cal Weaver, a devoted family man who enjoys puttering in his garden and playing catch with his teenage son, Robbie (Jonah "Zathura" Bobo). His wife, Emily (Julianne Moore), throws Cal's life into chaos when she announces during a typical "date night" dinner that she wants a divorce.
Recommended Videos
After he moves out of the couple's home, Cal has nowhere else to go but the chic neighborhood bar where he sips vodka and cranberry and tells everyone within earshot how his wife cheated on him with a guy named David Lindhagen (a tight lipped Kevin Bacon).
As weeks go by and Cal has worn out his bar welcome, the coolest guy in the place, Jacob (Ryan Gosling), takes it upon himself to rescue the sad sack. Jacob doesn't know why he's adopting this forlorn puppy and the audience doesn't really understand it either.
Carell has now, hopefully, completed his quadrilogy of playing fortysomething regular schmoes whose lives become exciting when lightning strikes to tip the regularity on its axis. In "The 40 Year Old Virgin" and this film, his middle-aged character finds himself forced to break out of the usual comfort zone into unknown sexual territory. In "Evan Almighty," God changes Carell's character's life by instructing him to build a modern-day ark, and in "Date Night," a case of mistaken identity at a restaurant puts the "regular guy" into dangerous unchartered waters.
The former "Office" actor doesn't have to stretch any acting muscles to find his rhythm -- we've seen this guy before, and the sameness dooms the film shortly after Cal gets his groove on after being made over by Joe Cool.
Moore looks strained as she tries to muster chemistry with Carell and Bacon, who both give her little to play off. The time she shines the most is in her interaction with 14-year-old Bobo, who steals every scene he's in.
Gosling brings out the best in Carell, and if this script hadn't zigged and zagged all over the place, it would've been great on its own as a fun buddy picture. Emma Stone (looking and sounding way too much like "Jessie" in "Toy Story 2" to be taken seriously) never quite gets her character's footing. Singer Josh Groban as her stuffy lawyer boyfriend and Marisa Tomei as a nymphomaniac teacher give a lift now and then to the film as it starts to sag in the middle.
Too many intertwined stories confuse the mix, and its smugly observational tone plays out like a lost episode of "Friends." Its heavily punctuated title gives a glimpse into what the film is all about -- lots and lots of conversation with long pauses, and barely a hint of exclamation. Unfortunately, like a relationship that's run its course, "Crazy, Stupid, Love." is simply unsatisfying.