Crazy, Stupid, Love

Imagine, guys (if there are any guys reading my blog!), having dinner at a restaurant with your wife of 25 years and you're looking over the menu together, trying to decide what you want.  All of a sudden, your wife blurts out what she wants.  A divorce.

That's what happens to poor Cal Weaver (Steve Carell) in this movie.  She tells him she cheated with a guy from work, David Lindhagen (Kevin Bacon) and that basically, it's his fault because he took her for granted.  I went to see it today and I loved it.  (I know I say I love every movie I see but I DO.  The only movie I ever didn't like was "Brokeback Mountain" and not because the guys were gay.  Because they were pathetic.  I felt more sorry for their wives and children than for them.  But, anyway, I DO love every movie I see.  I check them out carefully, wait for months to see them and I am very rarely disappointed.)

So Cal and his wife, Emily (Julianne Moore), separate and he tries to move on with his life.  He meets ladies' man, Jacob (cutie patootie Ryan Gosling), who changes his look and his wardrobe to give Cal back his manhood and make Emily "rue the day she ever decided to give up on him."  

But Cal, who hasn't dated in years (Emily was his high school sweetheart and the only woman he'd ever been with), bombs at dating because he can't shut up about Emily.  He does get better at it, though, but he's never happy.

This movie is hilarious, sweet, romantic and sad all at the same time.  I cry a lot at movies and this one did it to me, too.

This scene right here got me.  Cal had been sneaking over to the house at night to fertilize the flowers and snip the dead blooms off, trim the hedges, that kind of thing.  He's watching through the window when Emily calls him to "help her light the pilot light in the basement."  So he walks her through the process, all the while standing in the yard, looking at her through the dining room window.  She wasn't in the basement, she didn't need help lighting the pilot light.  She called him to just hear his voice but her pride would not let her tell him that so she made up a reason to call.  He stood out in the yard with tears in his eyes, she had tears in hers and Lordy mercy, so did I.  Why do people have to be so stubborn when it comes to love??

And why is that I can't see Julianne Moore on anything without seeing her as Frannie (and Sabrina!) on ATWT and Kevin Bacon as Tim on GL??  AND Marisa Tomei is in this movie, too.  Marcy on ATWT!  God, I'm old.

The movie's great and has a wicked little twist at the end that's hilarious.

Go see it this weekend.  And take somebody you love.