Sex Tape (16+, 90 mins) Directed by Jake Kasdan **Reviewed by James Croot
After a strong, attention-grabbing opening, this 2014 romantic-comedy goes rather limp, resulting in a less-than-satisfying experience.
At first it seemed like an edgier, grittier version of 2012’s This is 40 (although did every rom-com woman at the time have to have a successful blog and the dude work in the music industry?), it ends up being a cross between Date Night and Knocked Up, because it’s less about the stresses of modern life and more about couples behaving badly.
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Jason Segel stars opposite Cameron Diaz in Sex Tape.
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When they first met, all Jay (a slimmer-than-usual Jason Segel) and Annie (Cameron Diaz) did together was another chance to have sex. “There were erections everywhere,” Annie tells me on her Mommy Blog.
However, if one kid made that difficult, two made it impossible, and the couple is now reduced to trying to plan sex days ahead.
Both claim they haven’t lost that “loving feeling”, but when they can’t find the right mood alone on a rare evening, Annie decides to take drastic measures. She suggests they film themselves trying out every position from The Joy of Sex.
Carried away by the excitement, the plan works – except for one small detail. Instead of erasing the tape from his tablet, Jay syncs it to every device they’ve ever owned, including old ones they’ve given away to friends, family, and the mailman. Now the race is on to find them and delete the file before they are exposed.
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From genital accidents to prolonged dogfights, it’s hard not to get the sense that Sex Tape writers Jason Segel, Kate Angelo, and Nicholas Stoller had the Farrelly Brothers’ 1998 comedy There’s Something About Mary in the background as they wrote.
With Diaz donning an outfit to rival her dazzling debut in The Mask (and showing even more cheek than usual), this was a movie that seemed desperate to be this generation’s There’s Something About Mary. From genital mishaps to prolonged dogfights, it’s hard not to feel like writers Segel, Kate Angelo (Will & Grace), and Nicholas Stoller (Muppets Most Wanted) had the Farrelly Brothers comedy in the background as they wrote.
To be fair, they’re generating quite a bit of laughter from their increasingly crazier forays into sex tapes, making the most of Segel and Diaz’s easygoing chemistry. But as with director Jake Kasdan’s previous effort, 2011’s Bad Teacher, the humor is a slightly awkward mix of barbs, pratfalls, and look-away-now cringe.
A cameo from Jack Black (Be Kind Rewind) enlivens things, as does a creepy Rob Lowe (Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me), but one can’t help but be disturbed by the amount of product placement for a particular fruit-themed tech company (it’s really overwhelming – even though the film’s underlying message seemed to be that proprietary software and synchronization are bad) and the promotion of a particular porn site (an idea borrowed from Knocked Up).
Overall, the feeling is one of a less than cheap knock-off, knocked out quickly – something that may have contributed to it Diaz to take an extended break from filmmakingwhich eventually became a retirement four years later (although she recently reversed that to star in the upcoming action comedy Back in Action).
Sex Tape is now available to stream on TVNZ+