Day 58: Is It True That If You Don't Use It, You Lose It?

THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN  (2005)
Directed by Judd Apatow
Starring: Steve Carell, Catherine Keener, Paul Rudd, Romany Malco, Seth Rogan, Jane Lynch

I don't care much for sex comedies.  To me, they're nothing more than an excuse to show as much T&A as possible without having to resort to actually being funny.  Which is why I'm glad I came across this movie.

Carell plays Andy, a...well, it's in the title, folks.  Andy's horny, sex-obsessed co-workers (Rudd, Malco and Rogan) all do their best to help their friend in need.  But the thing is, Andy really doesn't want to have sex, which everyone around him treats as some kind of disease that is in desperate need of a cure.  All of this changes when he meets Trish (Keener), the woman who runs the eBay store across the street.  They hit it off.  Andy and Trish really care for each other.  Copulation seems inevitable.  But Trish doesn't want to complicate things by getting physical.  But Andy must tell her his secret, while his co-workers all learn a thing or two the virtues of a celibate and/or monogamous lifestyle.

I once remember a conversation I had with a film historian about filmmakers having a conservative message, but telling it in a liberal way (Well, okay, it was in film school, and the historian was my professor, and it wasn't so much a "conversation" as a "lecture," but, it makes me sound like I know what I'm talking about).  Anyway, this is a prime example of that theory.  There are boobs, butts and dirty talk galore.  But the overall message of the film is, "Hey, if you choose not to have sex, that's okay."  It seems like such a contradiction, but it works.  And it works because it does a great job of holding the mirror up to society. 

It also works because it's friggin' hilarious.  And again, its humor comes from observation of real life rather than contrived scenarios (with the possible exception of the chest-waxing scene).  Judd Apatow actually shows a lot of restraint as to what is actually committed to film - there's not as much skin as you might think.  But the dialogue alone could have gotten this film an NC-17 rating.  Then again, I hear pretty much the same stuff where I work every day, so it didn't really phase me much.  Also, that's probably also why I thought it was so funny.