May 2, 2012

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I have been ruined by the movies I Love You, Man and Forgetting Sarah Marshall in that, every movie I see with either Jason Segel or Paul Rudd, I expect them to be THAT funny. And then I get disappointed. And it happened with The Five-Year Engagement. However, once I got it out of my head that this was not another I Love You, Man, this was a pretty decent movie. It was very realistic and showed the trials and tribulations of one relationship. I really enjoyed it.

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Tom (Jason Segel) and Violet (Emily Blunt) have been dating for a year when he proposes. They are very much in love and can't wait to start planning their wedding.  Violet is waiting to hear back from Berkley to study social psychology for her post-doc and Tom is a sous chef at a very trendy San Francisco restaurant. When Violet is rejected from Berkley, she focuses on planning her wedding, only to find out her sister Suzie (Alison Brie) is pregnant by Tom's player friend Alex (Chris Pratt).  The pair are immediately married and soon Suzie is living the life Violet wanted.  Meanwhile Violet does get accepted to the University of Michigan's post-doc program for two years. Tom, being the amazing fiance that he is, immediately says they will go to Michigan and postpone the wedding for two years. What's two years when you have a lifetime together, he says. Besides, she will be living out her dream.



Within a couple months of Tom working at a local college deli, it is obvious he hates it there, but he refuses to talk to Violet about it. And Violet just sort of hopes Tom will adjust.  Soon, Violet hears that they could end up in Michigan permanently and they have a brief falling out.  After an argument, they sort of sweep it under the rug again, and Tom gets more acclimated. A little too acclimated, by growing a beard, hunting and basically giving up.



After getting drunk one night, Violet's professor kisses her and she realizes that she wants to marry Tom right now. Even though Tom is hesitant, he agrees and the get all the way to the rehearsal dinner, when Violet reveals that her professor kissed her. In a drunken fit, Tom threatens to beat the guy up and the proceeds to get drunker and hooks up with a co-worker. The next day, their would-be wedding day, they agree that it's over.



Fast forward a few years and the two are happily in other relationships, or so it seems. Tom is dating someone seven years younger and can't quite keep up. While Violet is dating her professor, when she realizes her relationship is not exactly peaches and roses. Tom emails her on her birthday and after a big blowout and a heart-to-heart with Alex and his parents, Tom realizes what he has to do.



And so on and so forth. You get the picture.



Along the way, there are plenty of laughs in this film that Segel wrote. There is some slightly nudity (yes, by Segel again) and some funny sex scenes. One of my favorite scenes is when Segel is with his new girl doing Zumba!  Too funny. And look for some references from past films Segel has been in.



The film is very realistic in the fact that people do amazing things in relationships, but there needs to be communication all the time. If you can't communicate, regardless of the circumstance then the resentment builds up. The couple was being selfish. And while, yes, there are times when you should be selfish, you also have to sacrifice and realize that others are sacrificing for you. For someone that was a social psych major, Violet seemed to not even see that Tom was unhappy. Or rather, she did but chose to ignore it. And Tom really should have just admitted he was unhappy.  By the end the two figured it out. And Violet said it best with, 'we may not have all our problems worked out now and we will probably have problems after we're married, but I promise you I will love you and make it work' or something along those lines. And I think that's the most important part of being in a relationship. Knowing that there will be bumps along the way, but always making sure to keep trying and keep working to make your partner (and yourself) happy.



Segel is funny, as always, as the cute, adorable, loving finance. While Blunt is charming and beautiful and a little bit quirky. While they do seem like an unlikely pair, they do make it work on screen.

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4 stars.