My Review of "Crazy, Stupid, Love"

Crazy, Stupid, Love came out back in 2011. It's hard to think that it's already over a decade old. A lot has changed over a decade and with that social norms have also been modified. There are a few things in this movie that will trigger a lot of people. Those that aren't into those type of things can have a good time with it though.

The movie starts out with a dinner date with our main protagonist Cal and his wife Emily. Everyone in the restaurant seems to be very romantically engaged except for these two. They've been together for 20 years and I guess the fire kind of fizzled along the way.

Unfortunately for Cal, their relationship has cooled off so much that Emily asks for a divorce during the dinner. He finds out that she's cheated on him with a coworker. Devastated Cal doesn't have the words to describe his anger and anguish. Instead he tries to be an adult during the situation and remains somewhat stoic. We still see childish antics coming out of him.

As you may have guessed, Cal goes to a bar to drink his woes away. At the bar he starts to become a bit of a downer to all the patrons of the institution. This gets the attention of a regular patron at the bar named Jacob. You can say he's a cool suave guy that's really good with the ladies. He's the epitome of what people call toxic masculinity in today's day in age.

Jacob feels for Cal and he decides to put it upon himself to give Cal a makeover. He wants Cal to start believing in himself and to get over the fact that his wife had cheated on him. We then kind of go into a gender reversal role of the guys doing an ugly duckling makeover movie.

While all this is happening there's a whole slew of side stories that kind of wrap around Cal's life. Although plentiful they don't totally get lost as they're pretty close to Cal's inner circle. They actually sort of help with the story in a very small sense.

The movie is quite predictable if you see a lot of these types of movies. If you don't watch these movies and not easily triggered you can have a grand old time with this movie. There are messages taught throughout the movie that may make some people cringe. Cal's son Robbie is in love with his babysitter and is taught to fight for her no matter what. This can be interpreted in many different ways. Kids at that age don't really know what's what so you can't really blame him. His intentions are good and he never really goes over the line. Some would say that he should be taught that if a girl tells him no then he should accept it and move on. This movie does the opposite.

I like what they did with the build up of miscommunication throughout the movie. You can feel the tension as it gets closer to the end of the movie. It's a bit of dramatic irony that helps the audience have a little extra fun while following Cal's antics.

The relationships of each of the characters seemed to meld well as well. Each of the actors did a great job in breathing life into the characters and the movie. None of these characters are particularly annoying or bad. Even Cal is a flawed character that realizes that he hasn't been the perfect husband or father as well.

Overall, nobody is perfect and we all have complexities. This movie shows this and has a lot of fun with it. It's predictable but very well crafted. I had a good time with it. If you don't think too much (and I don't know why you would with a romantic comedy movie) then you're going to have a great time with this one. I have to give this a 7.5 out of 10. There are enough twists and turns that sets this movie apart from the pack.