Review: Funny People
Directed by: Judd Apatow Starring: Adam Sandler, Seth Rogen, Leslie Mann
I was half way through a full analysis with spoilers, but I was basically telling the whole plot with commentary so that’s unneeded. I’ll try for a traditional one.
Funny People tells the story of George Simmons (Adam Sandler), a former comedian turned actor who has found out he has a rare blood disorder and his diagnosis is grim. This forces him into analyzing his life, and he finds it is full of nothing but meaningless sex, empty relationships, and a shallow career based on greed, not creativity. He goes to a comedy club to take a stab at stand up for the first time in more than a few years, and he bombs as his illness has made him angry, dark, and bitter. Ira Wright (Rogen) is a fledgling comedian who has to go on after Simmons and only gets the crowd back after making fun of Simmons act.
The next day George calls Ira to ask if he will write some jokes for him for a gig he has coming up. Ira accepts this offer from his childhood idol, but fails to tell his roommate Leo (Hill) that George asked for his help to. Ira lives with Leo, a more successful fledgling comedian, and Mark (Schwartzman), a self involved TV actor on a two-bit show. Their success eats at Ira, but sees this opportunity to work with George to be his shot.
After helping write some jokes for George, Ira comes on as George’s assistant and writer. This professional relationship buds into a friendship, as George has no one else in his life and confides to Ira about his illness, which he is now trying to fight with some experimental medicine. Ira convinces George to tell the other people in his life, the few that there are, about his disease.
Thats as much of the plot as I’ll get into for now. Suffice it to say, explaining the entire movie would take another couple hundred words.
Funny People is 25 minutes too long. It’s meandering. It’s self indulgent. It’s a near perfect character study of comedians.
For all the faults of this film, they are needed to tell the kind of story Apatow is going for here. This is not a comedy in the vein of Knocked Up or The 40 Year Old Virgin, going hard for the laughs and any story that came along with it was bonus. This is not a movie about plot, its not about a big climax or an ending. It’s about the characters.
This is definitely Apatow’s most personal work to date. He lets us be bystanders into a world to which in a way he has always been; he was only a comedian for a short time, and an actor for less, but nonetheless has been around this world for the past 20+ years. Apatow lets his characters stretch out and if it takes 5 minutes to let a scene fill out, he lets it happen. I would bet all of the actors have found themselves in a similar situation as their characters, so Apatow trusts these characters in their hands.
The story never really comes to this bursting climax, it slides like waves until it reaches the shore. This allows for an honest conclusion to this story, one that isn’t forced and is more mature than a few of the obvious endings would be. Also, its not like this film is some long brooding film. It is quite funny, and there will be tons of moments where you will laugh loud.
The acting is really top notch here. Rogen shows that he can handle a more dramatic role (if only a slightly dramatic one). Leslie Mann shines as George’s lost-love, Laura. Jason Schwartzman, Jonah Hill, and especially the debut of Aubrey Plaza as Daisy bring a fresh, lighter tone to the film, and really I think these 3 with Ira could have had their own movie.
The star of this film though is Sandler. I’ve never seen Punch Drunk Love, his first dramatic turn for which he won great praise, but I will be seeing it ASAP. Sandler brings a perspective to George that is the key to why this film works. He is insular, he is angry, he is empty. Despite that, it seems he was unaware of this, until his illness allows him to see what his life has become. Ira seems to be the first person since Laura to actually care about him, and this scares him. He is hesitant to open up, to allow someone else into his world. He continually is fighting these emotions, and that is the true complex of this film, and to me it was riveting to watch Sandler explore this part of his character’s psyche.
So like I said, Funny People may be long, and it may be a tad self-indulgent, but it is worth it if you let yourself into this world.
