Thursday, December 10, 2009

Laughs abound in It's Complicated


Nancy Meyers's latest film It's Complicated is filled with a plethora of wonderful comedic performances from its top stars like Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin to supporting players like John Krasinski that it left some people in the audience with tears.


It's Complicated doesn't open until Christmas Day but I was lucky enough to see advance screening tonight thanks to answering a tweet from Duthie's Books.


The movie is about Jane (Meryl Streep), a mother of three grown children and owner of this fabulous bakery in Santa Barbara, California. She also has this complex relationship with her ex-husband Jake (Alec Baldwin) who is now married to the woman (Lake Bell) that he cheated Jane with.


Their relationship gets even more complicated when Jane, her two daughters (Caitlin Fitzgerald and Zoe Kazan) and her eldest daughter's fiancee (John Krasinski) all head to NYC for son Luke's (Hunter Parrish) graduation with Jake coming too but not with his wife.


After a few glasses of wine over dinner alone, Jane and Jake find themselves having an affair.


More complications come in the form of Adam (Steve Martin), Jane's sensitive architect that is helping her build her dream kitchen. Adam is smitten with Jane but is also getting over a divorce that left him heartbroken but he still pursues Jane.


The affair of Jane and Jake and all the complications that result from it forms the basis of all the laughs and strangely enough, it was enough to sustain an almost two hour film.


Streep and Baldwin have some great chemistry together both romantic and comedic and that makes the film enjoyable.


And Martin plays sort of against type as isn't that wild and crazy guy except in one scene that involves some reefer. It is sort of weird seeing him pull back in being sensitive and romantic but it works in this movie but not so much in Shopgirl (yes I know that he wrote the book and screenplay but he just didn't work in that film).


Krasinski also holds his own against Streep and Baldwin. His comedic skills were razor sharp.


Another thing that I liked about this film was the strong presence of cooking and baking. It was funny that when Jane talked about her time as a pastry chef in Paris, I couldn't help of think of Streep's role earlier this year as Julia Child and how food was a supporting player in that film too.


I really loved the scenes of her cooking and her bakery looks so cool that it could only exist in movies. That scene where Streep makes Chocolat Croissants with Marting was deliciously romantic.


It's Complicated is a comedy for adults thanks to sharp writing from Meyers.


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