Judd Apatow has risen to the top of the comedy writing/directing heap, and it’s not hard to see why. Many directors of lesser films–and especially of lesser romantic comedies–unfairly stack the cards against a character, and, with it, directs the audience’s sympathy. Oh, he’s an asshole because he just doesn’t understand how to connect since his father left him as a child! Why can’t she realize that her job is holding her back from true happiness!? This sort of “alack!” and “woe!” all around is fairly simple to rectify. Do this or say that in the rain and you’ll be granted happiness and love and all that happy, sun-shiney bullshit.
Of course, none of this is real. Actual relationships with actual problems also come with actual complications. But I guess one doesn’t see When In Rome because you want to grapple with human frailty. You go because you really like Kristen Bell and hope against hope that things will work out for her, which is great since you know already that she will; it’s written all over the poster. Knocked Up goes against that idea by constantly mucking up the black-and-white set-up of most romantic comedies by throwing a big bucket of gray paint at the screen and letting you sort your feelings out.
First Run Criticism 