Date Night

Some movies have great stories told compellingly through technical direction and craftsmanship. These films keep you interested even when nothing important to the story is actually happening on screen. However, some films rely solely on charm and chemistry between co-stars for success. Date Night is not the first film, it looks slick and vacant of anything worth watching except for it's two stars. As casting goes, Date Night does keep you interested with the excellent pairing of Fey and Carell as a married couple. While the script struggles to provide enough clever banter to satisfy, their chemistry and ad-libs are what keeps the film going. Marky Mark, William Fichtner, Mila Kunis and James Franco show up for some pretty funny cameos, while Ray Liotta looks like he stumbled off the set of whatever his last crappy movie was and didn't step out of character. Oh, and Kristen Wiig and Mark Ruffalo are in this for, maybe two minutes. See it if you need to see Fey and Carell together on the big screen, I did

Greetings again from the darkness. Most married couples can probably relate to the grind of a life absorbed with work and parenting. Sometimes the fantasy turns into having a quiet moment of solitude. Heck, even "date night" can devolve into just another responsibility tacked on at the end of a long week. This is the premise for director Shawn Levy's film. The best part? It doesn't matter at all.

The reason this film works is not the plot or script, but rather the talents of the two funniest people in showbiz today: Steve Carell and Tina Fey. The two seem to have an exceptional comedic connection that brings out a timing that reminds of the best comedy teams of all time.

Sometimes what makes for the funniest comedy is putting "normal" people into exceptional situations and let them react. Here, Carell and Fey are just a typical suburban couple trying to re-ignite the luster of an all too comfortable marriage. The motivation comes when their friends (Mark Ruffalo and Kristen Wiig) announce they are splitting. This starts Carell and Fey off on a series of skits that would make Seinfeld proud.

The nightmare begins when the couple "steals" a reservation in a hot new restaurant and assume the identity of, what turns out to be a couple of low level thieves. The multitude of skits that follow include supporting work from dirty cops (Common and Jimmi Simpson), the real reservation holders (funny James Franco and Mila Kunis), a mob boss (Ray Liotta), a corrupt city official (William Fichtner) and a "security expert" in the eternally shirtless Mark Wahlberg.

The approach of the film reminds me of "After Hours", "Adventures in Babysitting" and "The Out of Towners". Some of the best comedy occurs when the main players aren't tossing out incessant one-liners. Think back to Cary Grant's screwball comedies. He was not a bumbling idiot or a stand-up comedian walking through life. His characters were reactionary to the odd-ball situations in which he was placed. That is the approach of Carell and Fey, and I hope they pursue future projects together.

I didn't have any original plans of watching this movie. However, after reading quite a few good reviews of it, I decided to check if my prejudice had been correct. I have been a fan of Steve Carell & Tina Fey for some time, owing to their performances in The Office & 30 Rock. Alas, what they do in this movie is nothing even comparable to what they have achieved on the small screen. The movie is based around The Fosters, a simple family with the basic family problems: too much work, less time with family, a mechanical and repetitive routine, a boring life, annoying kids etc. The movie follows the predictive plot of this couple going out for a quiet evening which steam rolls into a supposedly crazy wild adventure.

Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to complain about the plot. Its a standard comic flick and not some thriller. I don't expect a revolutionary story but I do expect a few good laughs from the movie which it definitely failed to give me. It mostly comprised of 10yr old kids' level jokes and a whole lot of overacting. But to be fair, I must mention the acting was terrible on almost everyone's part and not just the main star cast.

Maybe its just because of so many movies following the average-person-goes-super path, that this seems so boring and unworthy of spending 2hrs on, but the fact is that people expect more of such a great cast. From corny 1 liners to repeated jokes (Mark Wahlberg's shirt uhhh....), if the things were not overdone so much, the movie may not have been this bad. But nevertheless, I guess I went for this movie with way too much expectations due to the cast. Watch it if you love the leads and have time to kill for some so-so jokes. Don't expect too much & you may just come out without a frown on your face.....

I wonder how many married couples out there can attest to their lifestyle being nothing but revolving around work, family and especially kids, with the latter just sapping whatever free time they have in their waking hours, only to find themselves stuck in a wash-rinse-repeat cycle. The film examines in a comical fashion of course, the lifestyle of the typical family with working parents and young children, and how there isn't anything known as personal time, and having routine becoming the rot in their lives.

For the Fosters Phil (Steve Carell) and Claire (Tina Fey), such is their married life, with spontaneity and energy being sucked so dry, even their regular date nights seem like a chore. You know, that precious night where you think you can paint the town red with a babysitter looking after the kids, and the sad thing being that even that can turn out to be lifeless, save for their favourite game played during dinner, where they adlib what they think about other diners around them.

Which is pretty cool, given that the two comedians, as the blooper reel played during the end credits showed, hammed it up a lot with awesome ad-libbing and improvisation, that never fail to bring on the laughter. In fact, opportunities where they are cut loose and allowed to go really crazy, are some of the best parts of the film, breathing comedic life into a very simple story of how their, well, little white lie in order to get a table at a swanky restaurant, would turn their date night upside down into a crazy urban adventure, filled with thugs, cops, and well, a beefy Mark Wahlberg.

If I had a physique similar to Wahlberg's security expert Holbrooke, heck I'll strut around topless as well all the time, which serves as a running joke about Man's insecurities about the pectorals and abs of another. One of the nicer themes here involves how couples, beside spending time together, have to emotionally connect and be honest and upfront about their desires, and especially fears as well. In between pursuits and comedy, director Shawn Levy pauses the pace appropriately to inject some dramatic elements to sneak in a moment or two to examine just that, before stepping on the pedal to floor the film to its finale.

Like I mentioned, it's otherwise a very straightforward film that doesn't try to be more than it can be, keeping things simple and to the point, with great cameo appearances with the likes of Will.I.Am, Mark Ruffalo, James Franco and Mila Kunis being those instantly recognizable. Carell and Fey share an excellent chemistry and play off each other's antics really well from wit to the timing of their physical comedy, and you'll find yourself rooting for this average, normal couple, to be going one up against their adversaries in a single nighttime adventure, since all they want is to get out of their predicament, and back to their home and children like all parents do.

Stay until the end of the credits if you didn't have enough of the restaurant scene where Carell and Fey pose as arrogant Euro-trash, for additional laughs.

The suburban tax lawyer Phil Foster (Steve Carell) and the real estate agent Claire Foster (Tina Fey) have a boring married life in New Jersey. In their routine, they have once a week the "date night", when they hire a baby-sitter for their children and they have dinner in the same restaurant. When their best friends decide to divorce because of their routine, Phil decides to surprise Claire and have dinner in the fancy restaurant Claw in Manhattan. However, they do not have reservation and is almost impossible to get a table; when Phil overhears the waitress calling Mr. and Mrs. Tripplehorn, he lies and gets their table. Sooner two men invite them to leave the restaurant with them and they believe the invitation is because they took the reservation of a couple that has not shown up. But they discover that the couple stole a flash memory from the powerful gangster Joe Miletto (Ray Liotta) and now they have a serious problem to resolve.

"Date Night" is a funny and entertaining film with a non-original storyline about a mistaken couple that works. Steve Carell and the beautiful Tina Fey are hilarious in the roles of the suburban couple that has a night of adventure for taking the reservation of another couple in a popular restaurant. I believe most of the couples married for a long time will easily understand the situation of Phil and Claire. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Uma Noite Fora de Série" ("An Outstanding Night")