It's Complicated

Dear John Krasinksi:

You've done it again!

OK OK, he can basically only play one character; but it's good and I'm not sick of it yet, so he saved the movie for me. The movie was cute, and I enjoyed it, but I expected more from Meryl Streep's character Jane in the movie. I was never married for 19 years and had my husband leave me for a woman younger than my shoes, so I can't claim to know what it's like when he suddenly comes around again, but I can say it bugged me in this movie. From the previews I was hoping Jane and her former husband really did have some unfinished business, or were still in love and had just let time tear them apart. In fact no. Her ex husband Jake who cheated on her, IS A CHEATER. He finds himself attracted to his ex wife, obviously because she has moved on without him and has a happy successful life. He only wants what he can't have and blah blah blah, boring tale. Jake's young hot wife has a 5 year old son that runs him ragged, and she wants to have another baby. He's nearly 60 and this prospect is daunting, and a life with Jane would be settled. Their kids are grown and his work is done. He's a lazy, slovenly man who wants what's easiest. As a successful lawyer he was rich enough to attract the young hottie even while he was married with three children, and now he's not even happy with her.

After 10 years of divorce, Jane isn't thinking about a fling with her ex. But when her kids leave her alone in the hotel in NYC following her son's graduation, she and Jake find themselves sitting at the same bar, and get drunk, dance, and have sex in his hotel room. Jane was drunk, lonely, and hadn't had sex in probably more years than she cares to admit, but the affair continues even back in California. She's an attractive, successful, funny woman with her own business and a gaggle of friends. But she keeps sleeping with her MARRIED ex husband, who is currently trying to get his wife pregnant. He's the one cheating, but she's the one I'm disappointed in. He's a cheater by nature. He is a slimeball to the core, and it shouldn't surprise his current wife at all that he'd cheat. It's the oldest lesson in the world. He cheated on his wife with you. He's a cheater. He is going to cheat on you. The all star cast tricked me into expecting more from the movie than the same old same old. I thought the film would be smarter. I wanted Jane to refuse all of Jake's advances, or for Jake to have already been separated from his wife and not be "that guy".

Jake and Jane's three kids were the sugary-est most sickeningly perfect kids you can imagine. It was too much, down to the scene where all three are cuddled into bed crying over the fact that their divorced parents had been sleeping together but aren't getting back together. The kids were altogether superfluous in this film in my opinion, except for being the reason Jake and Jane are alone in a hotel in NYC, and for adding John Krasinki to the mix in the form of one of Jake and Jane's kid's fiance.

Jane had a second love interest blossoming in the form of adolescent Steve Martin, the architect for her house's new addition. Aside from one scene where he's totally high, I could have done without him as well. You don't even feel bad that Jane stomps all over his heart because he's such a weak excuse for a man. John Krasinski added the comic relief that I would have liked to see from Steve Martin. I think at the end we're supposed to feel like Jane is a strong, powerful woman because she rejects Jake's advances. But it's after weeks of allowing him into her bed, and letting his wife catch on.

There's an awkwardly moving moment toward the end where Jake is putting his wife's son to bed, and in his sleep, the son (Pedro), clutches Jake's hand to his heart and sighs. It nearly brings tears to Jake's eyes, but he still wants to continue his affair with Jane, and leave Pedro behind forever. It was just another unnecessary scene in the movie; if in fact nothing was ever going to come of it. I prefer for movies to have insignificant scenes that you think will be forgettable, then come back later to have served a great purpose. Nothing in this movie served any purpose. Jane's middle daughter is packing up and moving in the beginning, but you don't know where or why or even care. The awkward scene with Pedro. Jake and Jane's son claiming he has no memory of his parents together as a couple though he was 11 when they divorced. I kept waiting for something to mean anything, and it never happened.

I can't say I recommend this movie at all, aside from for minor entertainment.