In Which We Dig Deep Into The Screaming Maw of Apatow

Never Forget

by Alex Carnevale

1 hr 51 minutes

dir. Nicholas Stoller

Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Jason Segel’s ode to his life before he got laid because he was on TV, is destined to be a buried Apatow classic. When Apatovian scholars reach back into the depths to review the collected meaning of the familia’s output, they will dig out this little bomb with trepidation.

“Who wrote it?” someone will whisper.

“One of the actors,” another will respond.

“Which one?”

“One of the Jewy ones.”

“That narrows it down.”

“Lolspot.”

“What does lolspot mean?”

“Didn’t you read This Recording, a classic weblog of the 00s period?”

“No, I was too busy getting laid and tumbling nature scenes.”

“Oh.”

You get the idea. It is with considerable skepticism that we even approach this movie, which initially struck us like if Steve Buscemi had stepped out of the character actor jungle and directed his own film about having the same complexion as Gollum.

Yes, character actors wanting to be more is basically a description of all life. We can sympathize with young Segel’s plight. (Unfortunately, Segel didn’t churn out a three-hour film about the Peloponnesian War as we might have liked him to. Seriously though, why is Thucydides not yet a very rich man?)

love the tats RB

As Wiener put it:

Segel wrote the film (all by himself!) and stars in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, a movie about Peter, a sad sack who goes to Hawaii and finds his will to live in Mila Kunis’s tiny cleavage.

Most of the film’s positive attention went to British comic Russell Brand. We’re not really sure why – although his character of Infant Sorrow is hilarious and by definition anyone engaged in intercourse with Kristen Bell is ‘of note’, he usually plays the straight man in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. His function is for the occasional joke and to give Ross Douthat hard boners.

Like most films written by people who like the idea of movies rather than the dramatic conventions that cause us to care about characters, Forgetting Sarah Marshall has no plot or character depth. It has a premise, and jokes to go with it.

paul rudd is either 6’4″ or 4’11” i have no idea which

Sick of antiheroes with lovable hearts of gold, the summer of the loser attempts to subvert the hero paradigm by offering up characters so unlovable and unsympathetic that the only reason you care enough to sit through the next scene is the promise of a whale being unbeached into the ocean.

This is incidentally why a movie as overly long and preachy as Puss·E has attracted so much attention – at least we don’t hate ourselves for caring.

“Inside of You” – Infant Sorrow (mp3)

The poor shlub at the heart of Sarah Marshall is Segel himself. Like the gnome-like creature Tina Fey calls a husband, Segel works for the show his paramour stars in. In the film’s now famous opening sequence, she dumps him in the nude. (The scene is based on something that actually happened to Segel.) If only we didn’t see upskirt on a near hourly basis, perhaps this would be amusing.

you’re totally like the perfect brunette version of my ex!

Segel has a buried desire to stage a puppet version of Dracula. His masterful song, written from Dracula’s perspective, is the film’s emotional centerpiece, concerning itself with a person who really can’t let go. It’s absolutely hilarious and I can’t wait for his forthcoming resurrection of the Muppet Movie franchise.

“Dracula’s Lament” – Jason Segel (mp3)

The objects of the emasculated Segel’s affection are both gorgeous women without a thing going for them. What would Apatow do if he had an actually fleshed out female character and Leslie Mann wasn’t available? Thank God we never have to answer this question.

In the Kaelian appraisal of this film, the movie is about who looks prettier at any given moment. Thus when Segel’s dream finally comes true and his ex is wanting the tip of his penis between her molars, he can’t do it. He’s thinking of someone else’s pretty face.

Alex Carnevale is the editor of This Recording.

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