Crazy, Stupid, Love (2011)

"The war between the sexes is over. We won the second women started doing pole dancing for exercise."

Crazy, Stupid, Love follows three different love stories: Cal (Steve Carell) and Emily's (Julianne Moore) crumbling marriage, Jacob (Ryan Gosling) and Hannah's (Emma Stone) budding romance, and Jessica (Lio Tipton) and Robbie's (Jonah Bobo)...situation. Throughout the film, we watch as the men in these relationships struggle to gain (or regain in Cal's case) the affection of the women they love. Cal is trying to convince Emily they should stay together, Jacob is trying to crack Hannah's tough exterior, and Robbie is simply trying to get Jessica to stop fawning over his dad and notice him.

So yeah, this was a messy one.

I will start off by saying that, yes, I do firmly believe that this film walked so La La Land could run. I am an absolute sucker for a Ryan Gosling x Emma Stone pairing.

Now that that's out of the way, I will say that I enjoyed this film. Did I enjoy it thoroughly? Not necessarily.

On the surface, this film has it all. Three different love stories, family moments that make your heart swell, poorly timed pop culture references, hard times that bring tears to your eyes, and lots of loving gestures.

The reason I didn't love this film is... it lacked romance, if you can believe it. I found myself laughing out loud quite often, I will admit, but I rarely found myself curled up in a ball, smiling like a monster at the television screen without realizing, and that's what a good rom com should do.

I will give an honorable mention to the scene where Jacob brings Hannah back to his house, he admits to using the Dirty Dancing lift to pick up chicks, and then they lay in bed and tell secrets until the sun comes up. That did make me feel lonely, good job everyone.

I did also enjoy watching Cal pine for Emily's affection by tending to their house's garden in secret and helping her fix things over the phone. That was really sweet and it did tug on the ol' heart strings a wee bit.

One thing this film did exceptionally well was make me cringe. It made me cringe deep deep down in my soul. The amount of times I had to pause it, collect my thoughts, and prepare myself for what I was about to see.... embarrassing. Essentially, any scene in which Robbie is coming onto Jessica was one I had a hard time watching. The only scene that was worse than the one where Robbie professes his love to Jessica with a giant billboard (seen above) is the one where Jessica's parents find out she took nude photos to give to Robbie's dad Cal, who she is infatuated with. I felt like I was dying watching Jessica's dad open that envelope with Cal's name written in glitter pen on the back. A harrowing experience, indeed.

Overall, this movie had me laughing and smiling and crying in a vicious, vicious cycle. I enjoyed it for the most part, but still feel like the romance is lacking. That puts this film at #5 on my list, thank you Ryan Gosling and your fantastic abs.