Strangely, the the order in which I post on these movies is both the order in which I saw them and the ascending order of my enjoyment of them, so of the three, I enjoyed Funny People the least. It was a fine movie (I hesitate to say good) and an interesting movie, but it was definitely less than the sum of its parts. The movie definitely had Apatow's fingerprints all over it; there were scenes that were heavily improvised (the trailers show plenty of alternate line readings) and the film balanced lazy-guy humor with grown-up emotions. Adam Sandler also incorporated a lot of his own "personality" (by that, I mean his stage personality) into the movie to make it somewhat biographical. But the movie also diverged from Apatow's other two films, The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up (both of which I'll try to post on at some point, if only to make fun of Katherine Heigl) in that the journey of the leads was not as linear or uplifting.
The film tells the stories of George Simmons, a comedian who made it big doing stupid movies who is too much of an asshole for his own good, and Ira Wright, an up-and-comer who loves the world of comedy but is too sweet for his own good. George lives alone in a palatial mansion in LA. He has acquaintances, like Andy Dick and Eminem, he has employees (gardeners and chefs), and he has an agent (played by Bryan Batt of Mad Men), but he doesn't have friends. He spends his days feeling sorry for himself that he drove away the love of his life when he was younger because of his infidelity. Ira lives on a pull-out couch with two of his more successful friends; Leo is a much better stand-up than Ira and Mark stars on a popular (but extremely stupid) sitcom on NBC called Yo Teach!. After George received news from his doctor that he had a rare form of leukemia, he decided to take the stage at a stand-up club and deliver a macabre performance about what the world will do without him. Ira happened to go on after George that night, and when he started bombing, he made fun of George's act in order to save his act.
George took notice and although hostile at first, he realized that Ira (and Leo) had potential, and invited the two of them to his house to help write jokes. Ira jumped at the opportunity and boxed Leo out, seeing the invitation as his opportunity to finally become more famous than his roommates. To Ira, the offer was also an invitation to become friends with his childhood idol. To George, he was just hiring another manager. Although George often made bizarre demands to Ira, such as talking George to sleep, Ira stuck with him because he was now in a world that he could never have imagined before. George brought Ira along to a corporate gig for MySpace, took him for limo rides, and provided a glimpse of what success could be (Ira was too starstruck to see behind the glamor at first, though). Ira put up with the way George often mocked him and mistreated him because he was too enamored with the idea of who George was and the life he lived. George eventually informed Ira of his condition, to which Ira became very upset, and vowed to help George get through any way he could.
But then things turned around. While George was sick, Ira wrote off Geroge's abusive and erratic behavior as being due to his sickness and the knowledge of his impending death. But after George learned he was getting better, his behavior did not change. He was still the same self-absorbed, angry, asshole he had been since Ira had met him. Things got even more awkward for Ira when George's old flame, Laura, finally started talking to George again. The knowledge of his disease made Laura feel sorry for him, and after years of avoiding the man who had hurt her so much, she finally wanted him back in her life. Laura had gone on to marry a man who turned out to be similar to George in some ways; he also proceeded to cheat on Laura and he had a self-absorbed streak as well. However, Clarke could show compassion for Laura and their kids as well.
A series of bad events with Laura and Clarke, which included Clarke nearly killing George and Ira after learning that Laura and George slept together, the two comedians parted ways (that's putting it lightly). Ira finally realized who George really was and he knew that George was not the kind of person he wanted in his life. George saw that Ira was not just another kiss-ass yes-man who would allow George to get away with his bad behavior by not questioning it. Ira pointed out that not only did George's near death experience teach him nothing, George actually regressed a bit; George couldn't understand what he had done to put off Laura and Clarke when his numerous mistakes were readily apparent to every character in the movie and person in the audience. However, Ira did learn that if he was ever going to be successful at ANYTHING, whether it be comedy or wooing Daisy, the pretty comedienne across the street, he was going to have to adopt some of George's personality traits to a lesser degree. After all, Ira was so "sweet" (read: naive) that he treated Daisy like they were in a relationship before they went on their first date (he was upset that she slept with his roommate after Ira and Daisy had talked once). There is a bit of a happy ending, but it was more of a potential promise of happiness rather than happiness itself.
Funny People had many extremely funny scenes. And even scenes that were meant to be funny and were just fair, or were meant to be dramatic, had extremely funny lines. The Swedish doctor saying "Yippee ki-yay, motherfucker" after George made Die Hard references at his expense was great, and Laura's fake Australian accent (Oy!) was amazing. The actors' improv abilities were fully utilized and made for some great scenes with unexpected lines. Yet something about the movie seemed off. It was a little too long and the Laura/Clarke story almost seemed like it was a whole different movie because it started so late and required the action to move from LA to San Francisco. The movie was very dark, which both helped and hurt it in certain ways. I love darkness in my movies, but darkness must be balanced; characters who have bad personalities must either be fun to watch or have some redeeming traits. George had neither. Which was the point. The fact that George was so irredeemable was both interesting because it was what Ira needed to grow, but also grew tiresome. After a while, I wondered why Ira didn't skip out on him earlier.
Funny People is certainly not Apatow's best (40-Year-Old Virgin gets that honor from me), but it is certainly a movie worth seeing, if only once. It is the relatively rarely-seen story of the angst behind comedians and an unconventional story of personal growth. It is also hilarious in many (but not enough) places.
Up next: Alien apartheid...
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