Judd Apatow and The Comedic Renaissance
Funny People is a movie that I knew I was going to like. The reason? Judd Apatow. The comedian, writer, director…filmmaker…has been involved with several of the most memorable comedies of this decade. Whether it was 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up, or Superbad, chances are you have seen one of Apatow’s movies or at least heard phrases and characters referenced.
Apatow makes funny movies, plain and simple. There are plenty-o-penis jokes in all of his films yet his movies are different than sophomoric comedies so popular in the 1980s and 1990s. Growing up, I absolutely adored films like Dumb and Dumber and Billy Madison. Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler were two of the funniest people alive and their best movies (yes, I said BEST) included jokes about farts, penises, and poop. I find those things funny, as long as they aren’t overdone.
What has happened in the past, to Carrey, Sandler and almost every other comedian is that the humor is getting more ridiculous and the films worse. There were fresh comedies throughout this period that were definitely funny, I don’t want to make it seem as though we were living in the Dark Ages of funny business. However, comedies were more-often-than-not rehashes of the same jokes about bodily functions.
Then Mr. Apatow came and started the comedic renaissance. He decided to make comedies that are both funny and show complexity in their storyline. Imagine that! You mean that it wasn’t just going to be about how a bunch of high school/college kids trying to get laid? Well actually, no…they are many times about people trying to be with women. But in Apatow’s films the characters’ reasoning and ideologies change by the conclusion. It is not simply a film about guys making a pact to lose their virginity even if it starts out that way. Instead, the characters are lovable losers who actually explore their psyches and undergo character development. Yes, character development!
In many of Apatow’s films, the characters are nothing but young minded fools with one focus on their mind—sex. This is actually a pretty realistic idea, young men are really only interested in sex for much of their youth. Apatow knows this and all men know this. Yet Apatow also knows that men are also looking for relationships and acceptance, no matter how nerdy, geeky, or unattractive they are. It seems as though Apatow’s comedies are about growing up, but also realizing that laughter surrounds all elements of life. In his first films, the point was to find love and happiness, something everyone can connect to even if they haven’t experienced it themselves. In Funny People Apatow shows the importance of laughter is during life’s heartbreaking moments.
I won’t ever forget watching the red carpet pre-Oscar show a couple of years back and hearing movie critic Pooh-Bah Roger Ebert talking to Steve Carrell about 40-Year-Old Virgin. Ebert believed that it was one of the best films of the year and that Carrell gave one of the best performances. The talk was mostly tied to debate over whether or not the Academy should give more awards to comedies.
If you fast-forward to more recently, you can see that a change in mindset has already started to occur. Juno was a touching, hilarious comedy about a not-so-funny subject—teen pregnancy. It was showered with praise and awards and hailed as the epitome of a great comedy. I fully agree with these sentiments, but I do believe that Juno’s success was largely due to Judd Apatow’s groundwork. His movies had begun to change the way people were looking at comedies—as serious narratives that explore human emotions and existence.
Of course Apatow owes a lot of his success to the people in front of the camera: Steve Carrell, Seth Rogen, and company. But for all the help he has received, he has put in even more work. He is noted as one of the hardest working people in the movie industry and his films are always on time and on budget. Through this hard work he has gained commercial and critical success, something that has eluded so many other comedic filmmakers. With this success Apatow has more freedom to make projects of the same nature, but ones that can be even more complex in their narratives and themes. What is important is that Apatow has ushered in a comedic renaissance which will increase the legitimacy of my favorite movie genre.
