Is it wrong to call Forgetting Sarah Marshall, a movie that features bookended scenes in which star Jason Segal strips down to his birthday suit, his… um, coming out party? Well, I’m gonna do it anyway. The latest familiar Apatow face to headline his own movie, Segal, the writer/actor of Forgetting Sarah Marshall with the somewhat over-padded midsection, penned the story all because his buddy Judd told him, “No one’s gonna cast you in a lead role unless you write it yourself.” Truthfully, the storyline is not an original and can be simplified down exactly as you would expect from the trailer (guy dumped by girl, guy goes to Hawaii to forget girl, guy runs into ex-girlfriend while on vacation, guy meets new girl). But the experience of watching Forgetting Sarah Marshall is akin to hanging out with a group of friends the likes of which you’d continue getting into wrestling matches with well into your 30’s, friends who toss putdown jokes at one another as a substitute form of male bonding and then shrug those insults off immediately, and ones that would be just as comfortable lounging on the couch eating snacks (or cereal all day long) as they are drinking and partying ‘til dawn on the beach. That’s what the Apatow gang is. They just all seem to have their own killer sense of humor too. Segal, here as Peter, inherits the stalk-tastic characters he portrayed pretty much throughout both “Freaks and Geeks” and “Undeclared” too-short-lived and only now appreciated series. But he also maintains the genuinely harmless qualities he exhibited on television, his endearing nature and total inability to avoid awkward situations you can see coming from a mile off. That’s how Peter finds himself staying in the same hotel as his ex, running into them on a consistent basis and even being invited to join them for dinner by her new guy, an English pop star with a message (Russell Brand). He’s just so likable it’s impossible to view Peter as a threat. The film manages a lot of laughs for a genre that’s been mined over so many times before, and a lot of it has to do with its cast, from Segal and Apatow regulars Paul Rudd, Jonah Hill and Bill Hader… to newcomers Mila Kunis, Russell Brand and even Kristen Bell herself as Sarah Marshall. Everyone does well for themselves and the story avoids the over-the-top characters that occasionally grind some films of this genre to a halt (as in Wedding Crashers or Apatow’s-own Walk Hard). And even characters that start out as caricatures mature into something more. Plus, this crew is really reveling in their R-rated raunch. Nicely done. Bring on Pineapple Express.
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