There's always a time when a writer/producer in Hollywood experiences some success that the entertainment media is inclined to either revere their success as being a person whose touch turns everything to gold or a new voice. But as soon as this person has one or two flops, the media immediately does an about face gesture and disses the very person they celebrated the crap out of in just moments later. For instance, there was a guy like Kevin Williamson who wrote the hugely successful Scream films and then went on to executive produce Dawson's Creek on TV. Williamson was definitely riding high until the likes of his TV show Wonderland was cancelled quickly and his feature directorial debut Teaching Mrs. Tingle fizzled at the box office. Suddenly, the kind of overnight success that came to Williamson had virtually disappeared overnight. Ditto for guys like the Farrelly Brothers and There's Something About Mary and anything after it. The same for David E. Kelley when he was producing Ally McBeal, The Practice and Chicago Hope at the same time. It seems now that the media is onto Judd Apatow, who just recently, has come into his own as a new voice of comedy. For all the criticisms like his later producing efforts after The 40 Year Old Virgin and Superbad, such as Walk Hard and Drillbit Taylor, the criticism is pretty stupid. While I haven't seen Drillbit Taylor and don't have any interest in it, I did enjoy Walk Hard tremendously which the same can be said with Apatow's latest producing effort, Forgetting Sarah Marshall which is pretty good but not as good.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall focuses on Peter Bretter (Jason Segel), a music composer who works on a cheesy CSI-like cop show starring his girlfriend, Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell). Things are going good in the five years that they've been together or so Peter thinks, when one day out of the blue when she returns from being away, she devastates Peter: dumping him. Suffice to say, Peter is pretty shocked and worse, heartbroken when he finds out that it's over another guy. With his lifestyle seemingly out of order, Peter takes an impulsive trip to Hawaii as a way of working through the grieving process. But the grieving isn't so easy when he discovers that his now ex-girlfriend is staying at the same resort and she's brought the new guy that she left Peter over (Russell Brand), a hip rock star and walking hard on named Aldous. It's obvious that things are going to get harder for Peter and yet somehow, he's stuck playing the victim role while he watches this new couple's obnoxious public displays of affection reach disgusting heights. It's also that Peter makes the acquaintance of a hotel employee (Mila Kunis) that helps him deal with Sarah's dumping him.

I found Forgetting Sarah Marshall amusing but did I find it as good as Superbad or Knocked Up? Not particularly. I understand that any comedy that generally deals with a breakup will have it's serious share of drama and Forgetting Sarah Marshall is in no short supply of that. I admired the fact that they didn't allow the break up to really be nothing but a 15 minute interlude between the next comic sequence but a painfully thought out situation that doesn't heal as quickly as it does in the movies. As with a lot of Apatow films, the character development is definitely one of it's strong points and one might be inclined to dismiss Kristen Bell's character as nothing more than an ungrateful cheat who took Peter for granted. Now while that is true, screenwriter Jason Segel does provide more depth to Sarah Marshall than might be inclined.

But the thing about Forgetting Sarah Marshall and maybe it's my expectation of a Judd Apatow film, is that the actors are going to come up with out of left field quotes that accompanied Superbad and Knocked Up. I really didn't find that here, save for the fact that the studio needlessly marketed these lines in every trailer and TV spot from the likes of Jonah Hill and Paul Rudd's appearances. But be warned for fans of those two particular actors, their roles in Forgetting Sarah Marshall pale in comparison to the film's leads, if only to provide some much needed comic relief. To be honest, while I found the characters funny, it's really only Hill, Rudd and Russell Brand's characters who provide the kind of needed comic relief to balance out the dramatic equation that Forgetting Sarah Marshall so provides. Seriously, I don't think the film's introductory scene when Sarah drops the bomb on Peter would've been as funny if he wasn't butt naked. By the way, Jason Segel is indeed a fine comic actor and he plays the wounded puppy dog role well. But I could've done without a few of the shots where his privates are exposed in full view of the audience.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall is a funny romantic comedy and Judd Apatow is a guy whose helping redefine comedy as being accessible for everyone instead of focusing it on one kind of crowd. But it's not as funny as it will lead you to believe in the trailers, since this is a movie about a breakup and the filmmakers deal with it in an almost too painfully earnest way. The comic angle of Forgetting Sarah Marshall is played very well, but I don't think it was played enough to the point where the cast might have had more room for improvisation that they had in Knocked Up or Superbad. For that, the drama outweighs the comedy to the point where the story takes itself more seriously than you're inclined to believe. But either way, it is a crowd pleaser that I think one could enjoy at the movies.

Recommended: Yes

Movie Mood: Date Movie
Viewing Method: Studio Screening/Premiere
Film Completeness: Looked complete to me.
Worst Part of this Film: Pacing