Early Buzz: ‘Crazy, Stupid, Love’ - Best Romantic Comedy Ever Made?
As the summer movie season rolls along and most of us anticipate films likeSuper 8, Transformers: Dark of the MoonandCowboys and Aliens,Entertainment Weeklysuggests the movie of the summer might beCrazy, Stupid, Love. Yes,the cheesy looking romantic comedystarringSteve Carellas a newly single man who splits with his wife (Julianne Moore) and attempts to reenter the dating scene with the help of womanizerRyan Gosling, who himself falls for a girl played byEmma Stone. That movie. In the latest issue ofEntertainment Weekly, the film is widely praised with the headline “Best Romantic Comedy Ever Made (Recently)” and is favorably compared toJerry MaguireandAbout a Boy. Read some of the quotes after the jump.
The article (which is not yet online) appears in the June 3/10 issue ofEntertainment Weekly(with Jason Bateman on the cover) and was written by EW Executive Editor Jeff Giles. Giles says that while the full reviews won’t run until closer to the July 29 release date “EW staffers already feel evangelical about the movie” and that a made-up tagline like “It’s better than everything else. No, shut up, it is” would be appropriate to describe it. Here’s the trailer just so we’re all on the same page.
From the trailer, it seems pretty obvious what’s going to happen. As Carell’s character becomes more like Gosling, Gosling becomes more like Carell and the pair realize only the girls in question can make them happy. But is that it?
In the article, Giles agrees with producer Denise Di Novi’s sentiment thatCrazy, Stupid, Loveis “kind of Richard Curtis and Jim Brooks smooshed together with Cameron Crowe” and that it has much in common withJerry MaguireandAbout a Boy, two films with straight-forward romantic stories that have way more heart than the usual fare.
Carell’s acting is praised (“the lonely center around which a funny and touching constellation of love stories revolves”) along with Gosling’s abs (and “sly comedy) as well as Emma Stone’s charisma as the object of Gosling’s affections. The on-screen chemistry, especially in an improvised bedroom scene between Gosling and Stone, is also highlighted as a reason why the film works so well. “You get the sense even the actors are surprised by the variety of sparks flying,” Giles writes.
Finally, the article ends with the sentiment that while the trailer is amusing and looks predictable, the film goes beyond that:
Crazy, Stupid, Loveis a keeper, and it says something true and complicated about love.
Consider me sold, what about you?
