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Billed as a comedy but ending up more like a drama with some fun moments woven in. That is the best way to describe It’s Complicated, a movie I, even though I’m certainly not the target audience, was curious about seeing just because it seemed like pure fun to me. A talented cast with some genuine funny moments made me expect a laugh out loud comedy. It turned out It’s Complicated is more serious than I thought it would be, although I can see how this will fit the middle-aged women demographic it is aiming for just fine.
Revolving around a couple, Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin, that has been divorced for 10 years now. He cheated and married the much younger girl after the divorce while she has been all alone these years and is still not fully recovered. When together in the same Hotel for their son’s graduation a fire reignites between them and has them ending up sharing a bed and doing what next to sleeping happens the most in it. So now Baldwin is cheating on his current wife with his ex-wife which is an amusing turn of events. Of course they keep it a secret from the kids and as an extra factor thrown into the equation architect Steve Martin, also “recently” divorced, takes a liking in Meryl Streep who does the same with him.
As you might imagine this could be a farce, complete with misunderstandings and sneaking around and part of the movie plays it that way. Alec Baldwin plays every scene in which he’s in as if he was in a farce and to be honest, he is really fun to watch. But the movie, running almost two hours, plays it straight with an occasional farce-like scene here and there. Sneaking in a hotel together while a son in law catches them, or Steve Martin and Meryl Streep doing a joint before going to a party hosted by their kids. Most of these scenes are really funny, some of the overlong like the pot smoking scene. The straight side of the movie is sadly less interesting and takes up too much of its running time. There were moments in the movie when I watched the timer on the player, which is almost never a good sign. I found it to be a tad boring from time to time although I’m probably sure the target audience begs to differ with me.
The movie has a talented cast, and especially Steve Martin impresses as the serious love interest who has to play it straight. Streep has fun here, but Baldwin steals the scenes right out of under her feet. The most awkward moments were when they did everything to not have to show Meryl Streep naked in scenes in which she is just had sex. It felt like something from a daytime soap. Like I was watching The Bold & The Beautiful or something. But, to make things worse, they actually address that she goes to great lengths just to be naked under the covers; it looks better laying on your back than standing up she mentions. Yeah, that might be, but when you just had sex with a man the last thing you have is a feeling of shame. Standing up or not, he has just seen you naked. Standing up won’t change his opinion about your looks.
The movie was funny from time to time but dragged at other moments. The cast makes up for it by having fun with the script and somewhere in this mediocre 120 minutes long movie is a very funny 90 minutes long one.
