Knocked Up

Sunday, December 9, 2007

I decided to follow up Anchorman with Knocked Up to prolong my happiness until I went to sleep. Then, I realized I had watched Knocked Up pretty recently, and opted to view the commentary track. I've decided to include commentaries on the blog as part of the official count.

It's a funny commentary, but not the most informative. I was most interested to find out that about 50% of the movie comes right out of Judd Apatow's real life. It was also interesting to see just how much they were winging during shooting. Even though this feels a lot more tightly structured than Anchorman, they apparently were making just as much shit up as they went along. Most shocking to me was that they couldn't decide whether to make the kid a boy or a girl, so they shot alternate takes of every reference to the child's sex. You'd think that would be something they'd determine during the writing phase!

My point is, kudos to Judd Apatow for knowing how to reign in all this material and make a good movie out of it. The pacing of Knocked Up is perfect, and you'd never guess how loose the shooting style was. The more I think of it, the more I think one of these movies deserves some sort of award for the editing. More than 99% of other movies, these films really take shape during the editing process.

I like Knocked Up a lot, and it has held up to repeat viewings, but I'm still a much bigger fan of The 40 Year Old Virgin and Superbad. In think my main problem may be the cast of KU, which is a great one, but lacks a diversity of style. Too much of the movie is about Seth Rogan's character and his friends, and they are all pretty much interchangeable. Virgin and Superbad I think do a better job of fleshing out an interesting supporting characters and subplots.

Also, I think KU isn't as insightful as the other two movies are. Apatow does have a lot of insight into marriage and raising a family, but I don't know that he digs deep enough with Rogen and Katherine Heigl's relationship. Superbad and Virgin both have surprisingly touching payoffs, but I couldn't really care if Rogen and Heigl stayed together or not. The movie just relies on childbirth being touching. Which is more default than it is an earned emotional release.

Still, don't get me wrong, some very funny shit. Just falls a little short of the greatness of the other Apatow/Rogen collaborations.