THEY CAME TOGETHER Review

The romantic leads in David Wain's "They Came Together" are Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler, and it's inspired casting, both for the sake of comedy and that they actually look like romantic leads. Rudd is handsome but nonthreatening while Poehler is adorable and impossible not to like. This very thing is explained in the opening scene when their characters, Joel and Molly, are telling the story of how they met to friends, Kyle (Bill Hader) and Karen (Ellie Kemper), at dinner. Their story is like a cheesy romantic comedy, and the friends act as an audience stand-in. But it's not a movie; it's their real lives! And a millisecond before the scene cuts away, Poehler gives a knowing look right to the camera. It's perfect.

Don't forget that New York plays such a pivotal role in their story, that the city really is like a third character, something that's brought up over and over. "So if your life was a movie," the friend asks, "we'd probably open with overhead shots of New York?" Cue overhead shots of New York, and the movie begins. Written by Michael Showalter and David Wain -- the guys behind the cult favorite "Wet Hot American Summer," and Wain who more recently made "Role Models" and "Wanderlust" -- the guys have a whole hell of a lot of fun jabbing, poking and skewering cliches of the rom-com genre left and right. It's really a one-joke movie, but that one joke really works thanks to smart writing and a whole cast of funny people from Max Greenfield and Michael Ian Black to Christopher Meloni and Jason Mantzoukas. (Not to mention a late cameo that I will not spoil here.)

Beyond Joel and Molly, all of the folks who populate this movie are less characters and more walking, talking rom-com tropes. Characters will call each other big brother, best buddy and friend stereotypes without batting an eye. The whole thing plays out like a series of strung-together sketches wherein some of the gags are a little too out there and don't exactly work. But when the comedy is on-point with its satire of the genre, especially early on, it's firing on all cylinders with always welcomed splashes of vulgarity. And it's not just broad brushstroke satire; they get down to even the smallest details to take aim at from musical montages to characters always having one more thing to say before a scene's end ("shit"). While the third-act catapult into absurdity is a bit of a letdown, what comes before it makes that easy to forgive. It will probably be hard to watch any straight-laced romantic comedy through the same lens again. Bravo.

THIS IS 40 Review

Judd Apatow needs to learn to not be afraid of the editing room. Like his "Funny People," his latest personal project is a loose, meandering, messy and bit of an amorphous blob of a comedy. But it's also searing in its honest look at married life, dealing with parents, raising kids, getting older and maintaining a companionship that lasts. And if it takes his sloppy, imperfect style -- rolling, spontaneous, free-flowing improvisational riffs and scenes that sometimes are directionless -- to present us these truths he seeks, then so be it. It's worth it, and "This Is 40" is worth it. No other tighter Hollywood comedies today could squeeze so much out of its characters and show audiences what it's really like and take the risk of swapping out laughs for realness.

I was uncomfortable at first with how much a comedy was making me squirm. There are a lot of fights, a lot of arguments, and I thought to myself, "Well, this isn't very funny." But that's what makes Apatow brave as a filmmaker. He started back with 2007's "Knocked Up" re-envisioning what a comedy could do. He created his own sub-genre of comedy that was mimicked for years; that is until "Bridesmaids" set another new standard. And with this sort-of sequel to "Knocked Up," Apatow has done it again. He's given us a comedy that makes us look at the harsher realities of married life, of hitting that over-the-hill. It's not always pretty, that's for sure, with a lot of the gross-out comedy actually coming from droll everyday moments like having Pete (Paul Rudd) thrusting his legs in the air and wanting Debbie (Leslie Mann) to check for hemorrhoids.

Pete and Debbie we supporting characters, and we saw their marriage was less than perfect. Now, at the center, their marriage is dead in the water. They attempt to explain and negotiate to each other in therapy terms as their counseling has taught them, but they still sound like they want to kill each other. Pete's form of escape is hiding away in the bathroom sitting on the toilet to play Scrabble on his tablet. Debbie becomes obsessed with trying to make changes to the family dynamic: more healthy eating, and less Internet for the kids (played by Apatow and Mann's real life daughters, Maude and Iris get plenty of fun material to play with -- best is the older daughter's obsession with finding out how "Lost" ends).

While trying to be the best parents they can, Pete and Debbie have parent troubles of their own. Pete's dad, Larry (Albert Brooks), is too present in his life always asking for money to help support his younger wife and blonde triplet boys he can't tell apart. Brooks is a comedic cannon and scene-stealer in the fatherly role. Debbie's dad, Oliver (John Lithgow), is on the other end of the spectrum -- not present at all to the point of meeting his granddaughters for the first time. All of their drama comes to a head at a birthday bash where Apatow's loose narrative really packs its punch.

Aside from that, however, the crux of Pete and Debbie's issues stem from their financial problems. But they also live in the likes of Brentwood, Calif. which means they're actually still pretty well-off. It's hard to pity them when you're listening about Debbie's thrift store not breaking even as her hot employee played by Megan Fox might be stealing, or watching as Pete's record label flounders because he's signing has-been groups like Graham Parker (who plays a version of himself in the movie). Aside from the welcomed addition of "Girls" players Lena Dunham and Chris O'Dowd as employees of Pete's, this side of the movie -- which unfortunately takes up a large portion -- just feels like the grumbling of rich people problems.

The laughs are mostly hit-or-miss from all the movie's improvising, but one moment where Pete and Debbie get tangled in the politics of their daughters' school is an absolute knock-out from Melissa McCarthy. She plays a disgruntled mother, Catherine, who has an outrageous, mean-spirited, curse-filled tirade to why Pete and Debbie are horrible people; that is, however, after Debbie just got done unnecessarily yelling at Catherine's son in a moment of parental protection and vulnerability that perfectly captures Mann's character. She's the acting stand-out as a woman, wife and mother who's aggravating, kind, brash, sexy and insecure all in one, and she makes her Debbie breathable, living and oh so true.