I hopped on facebook moments before I left to see Cyrus and this status update appeared at the top of my news feed: advice from Josh and me: DO NOT SEE CYRUS!!! it is the slowest and worst movie we have seen in an incredibly long time. Waste of money. Just AWFUL.
I don’t know who Josh is, and I don’t value this girl’s opinion, but I still left my house dreading what I expected to be a huge let down. However, after a few minutes of watching John C. Reilly in his most natural, humanist performance since his roles in Magnolia and Boogie Nights, I knew I was wise not to heed the aforementioned critic’s advice. I went with a friend who had not seen a single trailer for the movie, and only knowing it starred Reilly and Jonah Hill, he expected it to be an absurdist comedy fraught with dick jokes about men in stunted adolescence. The film was a pleasant surprise in the form of a raw and nuanced story of, well, a few guys in stunted adolescence. Take that, add the beautifully vulnerable Marissa Tomei and the intimate, lo-fi stylings of mumblecore filmmakers Jay and Mark Duplass, and you have a really solid picture. Yes, there are some over-the-top Reilly/ Hill exchanges and some cheeseball sentimentality between Reilly and Tomei, but all in all, it’s a really charming little movie that I think will find it’s niche amongst guys like me who love a good rom-com.
