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Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Reviewed by Theo Michelfeld
Posted: April 20, 2008

Judd Apatow's remarkably prolific comedy troupe has yet another film in theaters this weekend—and less than a month after they handed us their greatest cinematic underachievement. Well the verdict, and the timing, are good. Their new film is called Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and it might well be subtitled Forgetting Drillbit Taylor, because this movie is every bit as hilarious as that one wasn't. Apatow's team of jesters is alive and well after all, and their new film can stand proudly alongside The 40-Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, and Superbad in their growing catalog of brilliant comedies.

It amazes me just how many times these guys can keep tickling the same funnybone and getting the same result. Forgetting Sarah Marshall is hardly new thematic material, and yet the formula works once again, because (to tweak a platitude) the comedy is in the details. This film introduces us to Peter, yet another romantically challenged, big-hearted, less-than-sophisticated male hero—and yet as portrayed by Jason Segel, who also wrote the screenplay, Peter plays his own unique riffs on Apatow's well-explored theme. Peter is a frustrated musician, whose job is to compose the ominous synthesized score for a TV show about crime scene investigators. He's also dating the show's star, a tenuously famous beauty named Sarah Marshall. As the film begins, Sarah dumps Peter and breaks his heart. He finds reminders of her everywhere, and so takes a vacation in Hawaii to get her off his mind. But sure enough, she is there already, and staying in the same hotel, on a romantic getaway with her new boyfriend, a fictitious rock star named Aldous Snow.

One of this troupe's repeatedly successful tactics is to make films in which there are conflicts but no real villains. (It's notable, by the way, that this is not true of their clunker, Drillbit Taylor.) A much lazier version of Forgetting Sarah Marshall would have made shallow caricatures of Peter's tormentors, but this film prefers to let all of its characters be funny and human. And so Sarah Marshall, although something of a lost soul, is also permitted to be a sympathetic character. And Aldous Snow, although a preening, self-adoring Lothario, is also a congenial fellow, a quick wit, and something of a half-assed poet. It makes for fertile comedic ground. As the viewer might quickly guess, Peter finds a new love interest in Hawaii, the hotel receptionist (portrayed by Mila Kunis.) When the four characters sit down to dinner together, the tension, good will, jealousy, resentment and humor flying around the table is a riot. Meanwhile, supplementing the lead actors are peripheral performances from Apatow alumns Bill Hader, Jonah Hill, and Paul Rudd, all funny. Bill Hader, in particular, is a gas. And Jack McBrayer, of TV's 30 Rock, has a painful cameo as a pious husband bewildered by his wife's sexual creativity on their honeymoon.

I mentioned the Apatow formula earlier, and of course a big part of the appeal of these films is the weirdly life-affirming coefficiency they strike between crudity and romantic wisdom. Forgetting Sarah Marshall is no exception. Furthermore, it concludes itself with an elaborately staged musical based not so much on the character of Dracula, but on "The Count," the vampire Muppet from Sesame Street. If you have trouble imagining that, relax; you don't have to. These filmmakers have imagined it for you, and it's an actual scene in their movie. Brilliant and hilarious, folks, that's Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Hats off to Judd Apatow and Company. They've done it again.

Copyright © 2008 Theo Michelfeld