Movie Review - Date Night

Date Night

Movie Review
by Olivia Sutton

 

Starring Steve Carell, Tina Fey,  Mark Wahlberg, Jimmi Simpson (Mary the Profiler - "Psych")

 

 

There is an old saying that "Most men live lives of quiet desperation."  The opening of  Date Night, shows us a 40-something married couple who a both living quiet, suburban lives of quiet desperation - he's a tax accountant, she's a realtor.  They have two kids, a house in the New Jersey 'burbs, and even the clichéd white picket fence.  Even their weekly "date night", has become hackneyed and boring.  When their best couple friends tell Mr. and Mrs. Foster (separately, no less) they are getting a separation out of sheer boredom, Mr. Phil Foster (Steve Carell) decides they need to do something different for the next date night.

 

So they head into Manhattan - and (as anyone who's seen the previews knows) end-up swiping a reservation at a swanky seafood restaurant.  And chaos ensues.  The couple is mistaken for another couple who are up to no good.  That's the basic set-up of the movie.

 

Date Night has everything - humor and character comedy.  Carell is instantously likable (in fact, "Phil Foster" reminds me very much of Carell's "Maxwell Smart" - except Max knew he was an agent; Foster really is just an accountant).  A couple of McGuffins and mistaken identity drive the plot of  the film, but what makes the film really work is having two normal people who are dropped into a ridiculous situation - finding excitement and a renewed relationship with each other.  These characters feel real - yet at the same time the movie is very, very funny.  Carell delivers one-liners like nobody's business, but Fey also manages to get in a few zingers (my favorite being her unintentional paraphrasing of Ginger Rogers:  "Just remember everything you're doing, I'm doing in heels!" as the two scale a fire escape.  And, like the best of the Cary Grant/Katherine Hepburn screwball comedies - from tiny beginnings (taking a reservation from a no show so they could have a nice date) the situation just gets more and more intense and thus funnier and funnier.  There's danger in Date Night (again, like there was in Get Smart) and humor - a rare but perfect combination.

 

This film also has the funniest car chase scene I've seen since The Blues Brothers.  And the entire audience in the theater I saw the movie with were also roaring with laughter during that bit.  And seriously - the film is laugh-out-loud funny without making fun of the characters.  At no point are Carell and Fey's characters the butt of the jokes -- the situation is funny because normal people are put into an outrageous situation.  The occasional senses of danger work, but also have that 80s-TV feel of  "no one is going to get seriously hurt, here, even the bad guys, so just have a good time".  I checked Carell's page on IMDB after seeing the film ('cause I was trying to place his accent) but I found the following quote there:  "I think a character in a comedy should not know they're in a comedy."   Which is true - good comedy comes from putting realistic characters in funny situations, not making fun of characters to the point where you cringe watching it.

 

I highly recommend seeing Date Night.  Despite the title, it's not your traditional romantic comedy - more of a romantic action/adventure/comedy thing.  The characters, especially Carell and the various people he and his wife run into in one wild night are also well-drawn.  For those of you reading this who also watch Psych on USA Network, if you remember "Mary - the profiler"  from "An Evening with Mr. Yang" he's in this. And, no, I'm not telling you who he plays!  Oddly enough, because of the humor, action, and even a touch of romance - Date Night might be a great date movie, but definitely not in the traditional weepy chick flick sense.  It's a film virtually anyone can enjoy.