I positively hated the beginning of Nancy Meyers’ latest film It’s Complicated. The entire set up was absolutely groan inducing. Watching Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin play a divorced couple who get drunk and ultimately get jiggy with it in a hotel room was positively insulting. It was like watching a really awful sitcom unfold right before your eyes. These talented performers are supposed to be giving us a look at life after 50, but actually they’re treating us to something you might see in a bad high school comedy. But then perhaps that’s the point. Whatever the case may be, it wasn’t working for me at all.
Then a strange thing happened. No, It’s Complicated didn’t turn into a work of comic genius, but it did start to settle a bit, and I attribute a lot of that to the performances. This includes Steve Martin who plays his role as the new twinkle in Streep’s eye with sweet natured aplomb. Alec Baldwin by contrast plays Streep’s ex as if he were a confused schoolboy trying to come to terms with a break up. In the end though, he’s a funny guy doing silly stuff and even when Baldwin’s character is acting like a child, we slowly begin to see the scared man just below the surface. As for Streep? At 60, she remains one of the great actresses of all time, and while she’s good here, we’ve seen her so much better in countless other films including this year’s Julie and Julia.
Meyers works hard for every joke. Perhaps too hard. Example? There are a couple of scenes in which Streep has little get-togethers with her girlfriends. The comical word play is so painfully stale, that Meyers has these women laugh aloud at each others’ bad jokes in desperate hope that we the audience will laugh with them. Didn’t work for me. As is the case with most of Meyers’ films, there is a serious side to Its Complicated, and the final act of the movie has Streep trying to explain to her kids and a potential new boyfriend what’s been happening between her and her ex-husband. Streep is able to convey a sense of dignity and truth, but the film as a whole still feels slightly hollow. That’s because It’s Complicated is taking something a bit serious and fluffing it out for the entire world to enjoy. Given that I’ve never been divorced (nor have I reached 50 yet), I’m fully aware that I’m not exactly this film’s target audience, but I still know a funny film when I see one, and Its Complicated misses more than it hits. There are certainly terrific moments here (watching Martin and Streep get high was a scream and seeing Baldwin make fun of his own worn down physique was also worthy of a chuckle) but for every funny gag is a joke that stops the film dead in its tracks (a labored gag involving Alec Baldwin’s penis could have been funny in a different context). Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin, Steve Martin, and John Krasinski do their best to help keep this one afloat but it doesn’t quite get there.
