Thursday, November 8, 2012

Celeste and Jesse Forever (2012)

Jack and I loved this grown-up romantic comedy co-written by and starring Rashida Jones as a career woman pulling away from her Peter Pan husband played by Andy Samberg. I wrote a little about Jones way back in I Love You, Man, then skipped right over her in The Social Network, The Big Year, and The Muppets. Had I gone that way I would have mentioned her funny stuff in Parks & Recreation. She  wrote the screenplay with her writing partner Will McCormack (he played Courtney Cox's brother on the series Dirt and one of the tech guys on Brothers & Sisters; this is the first produced script for both of them) based on their relationship: better as friends than lovers. He has a cameo as a sleazeball friend of Jesse named Skillz. They also have in common that they come from show business families. His sister is actress Mary McCormack (whose husband produced Brothers & Sisters) and her father is Quincy Jones and mother is Peggy Lipton from The Mod Squad. Samberg (best known for 138 episodes so far of Saturday Night Live 2005-2012, he was in I Love You, Man and a few other things) and Jones definitely have chemistry as the about-to-be-divorced couple who want to remain close.

We saw this seven weeks ago as I was about to go out of town, planning to see another movie written by a woman that day, but at the last minute I chose this instead. I can't remember what the other one was, though. This one was directed by a man, Lee Toland Krieger (The Vicious Kind).

There are a lot of hip songs, listed here, on the soundtrack. Additional music is provided by Rashida's nephew (and Quincy's grandson) Sunny Levine with Zach Cowie.

Shot mostly with a handheld camera, this induces motion picture motion sickness (MPMS) on the big screen. Lucky for you, it isn't playing on any now and you'll be fine watching it at home.

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