This week, Fat Guy Kevin Carr runs screaming from little blue people invading his life and seeks refuge in the old west, hoping that James Bond and Indiana Jones will protect him. When he returns home, he has a fight with his wife and uses the events of Crazy, Stupid, Love to put his relationship back together. What a godsend Hollywood can be for marriage woes. Finally, Kevin curls up for a long nap after an exhausting summer movie season with many more arrests than he ever thought he’d incur.

In Glenn Ficarra and John Requa‘s Crazy, Stupid, Love., we meet Cal and Emily, a long-standing couple in which only one half of them recognizes that the “standing” could in fact be traded out for “suffering.” Cal and Emily have some lovely kids and a nice house and what appear to be stable jobs, but there’s something missing. Within the film’s first ten minutes, Emily (Julianne Moore) has asked for a divorce (in the middle of a dinner out, no less) and revealed that she’s had an affair (with one her co-workers, played, of course by Kevin Bacon), leading Cal (Steve Carell) to purposely fall out of their car and announce to both their son and babysitter what has just transpired during the world’s worst date night (and Carell knows from bad date nights). And thus begins Cal and Emily’s halting journey to return to a state of normalcy, if not a state of reaffirmed union.

With Crazy, Stupid, Love, writer-director duo Glenn Ficarra and John Requa are coming off of the criminally under-seen I Love You Phillip Morris. Very few saw commercial appeal in their Ewan McGregor and Jim Carrey-starring love story, and the box office numbers were further proof that there was a definite, and very sad, truth to those predictions. It doesn’t appear they have anything to worry about when it comes to their new, star-filled romantic comedy though. I Love You Phillip Morris has a dark and divisive sensibility. Crazy, Stupid, Love is the opposite and shows obvious mass appeal. In making a film for a broader audience, Ficarra and Requa managed to make love stories — it is an ensemble film — that are neither cynical nor dopey. Here’s what Glenn Ficarra and John Requa had to say about taking on the commercial project, their 3-hour version of the film, and their important lessons at film school:

The young adult series “The Last Apprentice”, or “The Wardstone Chronicles” as it was originally published in the UK, is going to go forward toward a big screen adaptation with actress Julianne Moore in a key role. Originally this film was to be called The Spook’s Apprentice and it had Alex Pettyfer, Jennifer Lawrence, and Jeff Bridges signed on. Things have changed. Pettyfer and Lawrence have both dropped out of the project, Lawrence for Hunger Games reasons and Pettyfer perhaps for the same. The film is now tentatively titled The Seventh Son and while Jeff Bridges is still attached, it’s going to have to find new young actors to fill out the cast. Moore has been cast as the character of Mother Malkin, who is apparently a great and powerful witch. Bridge’s character is known as The Spook, and he is an expert in exorcism. Seeing as the film was originally title The Spook’s Apprentice, I would imagine that Bridge’s would have a mentoring role in the story. The Amazon summary for the first book in the series, also called “The Spook’s Apprentice”, reads as follows:

I know what you’re thinking: “That’s not what the regulation Sex Scouts uniform looks like! Couldn’t this production have done any research?!” And you’d be right, but you’d be missing the point. In Elektra Luxx, Carla Gugino reprises her role as the titular porn star who has given up the business for baby. And, yes, it’s hers. The funny, sexy, strange, soap-y comedy was written and directed by Sebastian Gutierrez as the meat of a Women in Trouble and Women in Ecstasy trilogy. It’s got the same heart, ovaries and potty mouth as the first, and it now has more Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a sex blogger. Check out the surprisingly not-red-band trailer for yourself:

This past weekend saw the cinematic glory of Resident Evil: Afterlife pushing past security to get into your local theater even though it was moving slower than an instant replay in a curling match. The absolute atrocity of this film raises a lot of questions, but one of the first and foremost is whether or not directors should work with their spouses in a leading role. Paul W.S. Anderson, who thinks Milla Jovovich is as big an action star as Sigourney Weaver, is also married to Milla Jovovich, and while we can’t prove causation for the low marks in her performance here – we can certainly point to correlation. We can also point to 9 more husband and wife teams in order to find out if working with your legally bound significant other is really such a great idea.

Amongst the universal critical applause currently being bestowed upon Lisa Cholodenko’s The Kids Are All Right, one bit of praise seems to connect them all: that the film isn’t didactic or preachy regarding the same-sex couple at its center. In other words, it’s a film about a gay couple but doesn’t overtly shout that it’s about a gay couple; the premise isn’t addressed as if it were unique, exceptional, or odd – nor is it, arguably, a major source of the film’s comedy – rather the film proceeds without seeming intent on making a statement on gay couples or gay child-raising in contemporary society.

The summer movie season is known for a lot of things… explosions, CGI overload, superheroes, and sequels to name a few. What it doesn’t really see a lot of are films dealing in human emotions, raw truths, and real life. The Kids Are All Right is one of the rare exceptions to that rule (that I just made up), and aside from implying that anyone would be sexually attracted to Julianne Moore it just may be the most honest film of the summer. Joni (Mia Wasikowska) and Laser (Josh Hutcherson) are California teens living with their two moms. Nic (Annette Bening) birthed Joni and Jules (Julianne Moore) birthed Laser, both through artificial insemination from the same sperm donor, and life has been fairly conventional up until now. Joni has recently turned eighteen and at the constant nagging of her brother has contacted the sperm bank in the hopes of meeting their biological father. Paul (Mark Ruffalo) is a laid back restaurant owner in a casual relationship with an employee (the stunningly beautiful YaYa DaCosta), and he’s both surprised and intrigued at the idea of meeting the end result of his past donations. Nic and Jules reluctantly welcome Paul into their lives and soon the calm and orderly existence they thought they had is turned upside down.

What is surprising to me with a film like Lisa Cholodenko’s delightful, layered comedy The Kids Are All Right, is that it will be heralded as a smart, funny look at the “modern family.” Something that we’re only now seeing more of.

Anyone can make a movie that is sexy. In fact, I’ve seen more than a few films in my day that were sexy, and nothing else. What they give us visual stimuli is not balanced with any substance. Substance is what can make a sexy film an erotic one. Substance is the key to Atom Egoyan’s Chloe. That, and the performance of Amanda Seyfried.

The moment after The Kids Are All Right bursts open with a feverish soundtrack, it is easy to see that this movie has great energy. And great energy is a great start.

When Liz suggests taking TGS on the road to counter bouts of winter madness, Jack approves as long they take the show to Boston where he can be close to Nancy (Julianne Moore).

The Fat Guys suffer through the January Sewer, which is the weeks of the new year that hold very little hope for quality films. They haven’t seen anything this week, due to non-screenings and late screenings, so they talk about the upcoming Spider-Man reboot.

To this point we’ve seen little but singing, sweetness and hilarious dumb-blondiness from Amanda Seyfried. Which is what makes this trailer for Chloe so interesting.

The feature filmmaking debut of fashion designer Tom Ford, A Single Man often resembles a magazine photo spread sprung to life.

Well, it depends on what HBO Films/BBC Films’s definition of the word “Hope Davis” is.

Indie film! Same-sex couples! Mark Ruffalo! It’s not all as sensational as it sounds, but Annette Bening and Julianne Moore are involved to let us know The Kids Are All Right.

I seem to remember signing something that guaranteed that we wouldn’t have to hear about the Clintons after the election. Does anyone else remember that?

Lets face it, not every film can be a winner, no matter how badly you want it to be good. This particular theory was one that I was reminded of this week as I screened Fernando Meirelles’ latest film Blindness.