This Is 40
Judd Apatow
The story: This is the spin-off sequel to writer-director Judd Apatow’s Knocked Up (2007), in which the moviegoer was first introduced to the characters of Debbie (Leslie Mann) and Pete (Paul Rudd). She now runs a clothing shop and he owns a tiny record label. They are still married, have two daughters and are about to hit the speed bump that is the big 4-0.

Is writer-director Judd Apatow losing his Midas touch? After hits such as The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005) and Knocked Up (2007), one was expecting yet another raucous comedy filled with potty- mouthed dialogue and laugh-out-loud situations.
Instead, this feels like Apatow’s attempt to go in a more dramatic direction.
This Is 40 strings up scenes from a marriage between the more uptight Debbie and the laidback Pete and ends up feeling episodic in nature.While there is plenty of smutty dialogue, much of the talk about sex is graphic in a way that is not particularly funny.
Where it works is in Apatow’s ability to convey that volatile mixture of intimacy and resentment that long-time couples share. One moment, Debbie can be needling Pete about his junk food-eating habits; the next, she is reluctantly examining his bottom for haemorrhoids.
It comes together in a sweet scene in bed when they fondly talk about how they would kill each other off.
Paul Rudd (I Love You, Man, 2009) and Leslie Mann (Funny People, 2009) make the relationship feel lived-in and the frustrations of the characters keenly felt.
That said, the movie is simply too long and the moments of genuine emotional connection are few and far between.
Instead of focusing on family – what with Debbie’s distant father Oliver (John Lithgow) and Pete’s childish dad Larry (Albert Brooks) and his brood of three very young sons – the script is burdened with unnecessary extras. There is Megan Fox as an employee Debbie suspects is stealing from her and Melissa McCarthy as a mother Pete has a run-in with.
You wonder how much of his own marriage Apatow is channelling since he and Mann are married in real life with two daughters, Maude and Iris, who play 13-year-old Sadie and eight-year-old Charlotte in the film.
There is more blurring of reel and real as the artist Pete is promoting is real-life under-the-radar act Graham Parker & The Rumour.
Perhaps a greater separation of fact and fiction would have helped. As it is, This Is 40 feels self- indulgent to an extent that previous Apatow comedies did not.
(ST)