Love & sex at forty-something

Film review: It’s Complicated

MANILA, Philippines - It’s Complicated is a merry lark that should delight a lot of people. OK, let us change that to should delight a lot of females. Those are actually the film’s target market, mainly those in the 40 and above bracket. But it should also rate some laughs with the younger girls. As for the men, I do not see anything that they can enjoy about the movie. That is unless they happen to be intelligent, secure and accepting of the humiliating peripherals in the aging process. 

They should take a cue from Alec Baldwin. The handsome movie star of some years ago, remember him in Beetle Juice, now smartly uses his expanding gut to fuel his second wind. Not only has middle-age given Baldwin the most successful phase of his career, it has also earned him respect as an award-winning actor. I think he now owns a few Emmys, Golden Globes and SAG trophies for his work in the TV comedy 30 Rock.

Baldwin plays Jake, the adorable womanizer in It’s Complicated. He divorced his wife of 20 years to marry a young model, who as the opening scene shows has perfect abs. Ten years later, his life now consists of visits to the fertility clinic because his wife wants to have a baby, running errands, also for his wife, and making sure that his obnoxious stepson behaves. That is also in service of his wife. 

It is no wonder then that meeting his ex-wife at their son’s graduation brought back the happy memories of their life together. Meryl Streep plays his wife Jane. She now packs some extra pounds and some wrinkles and gets hot flushes. That is why she fans herself in many scenes. But everybody adores her and as he found out after a drunken romp in a hotel penthouse suite, that everybody includes Jake. As he remarks with a blissful smile after sex, she is home sweet home.

Why not? With their children grown, Jane has no more babies to tend. No brats around. With the children moved out, she has this sprawling house straight out of Home & Garden to herself. She is an excellent cook. In fact, she owns a restaurant where she bakes the bread and pastries and serves herbs grown from her own garden. Free meals. How very convenient. And to top it all, there is a man smitten with her, an architect played by Steve Martin in his best leading man mode. No husband, even an ex, likes the idea of having another man enter his territory.

This situation results in lots of funny scenes in beautiful sets peppered with witty dialogue. And the cast is truly excellent. But what is even funnier than the picture is the idea that had It’s Complicated been filmed 20 years ago, not one of the principal actors would have been cast in those roles. For one, the characters would have been written as younger. Middle-age was a no-no for romantic comedies.   Jake would still be a lovable cad looking perhaps like Billy Crystal. Tom Hanks would have been the architect with the promise of true love. And Meryl, whose career then meant tearful award-winning turns with strange accents would have never been cast as the sweet leading lady. Meg Ryan perhaps or Sandra Bullock.

Credit director Nancy Meyers for the change. She now owns the franchise for rom-coms for the older set. She does romantic comedies well, Baby Boom with Diane Keaton and Holiday with Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz. But she does romantic comedies of the menopausal kind even better. What Women Want with Mel Gibson and Helen Hunt and Something’s Gotta Give with Jack Nicholson and also Keaton. 

Although Meyer provides complications, it cannot be denied that the focus of these stories about older people is love and sex. Such things can also happen to those over 40 or more. Perhaps not in the sort of dreamy way she presents it but fantasies are what movies provide and Meyer hit upon the ultimate one with It’s Complicated.

I cannot think of anything better for the female ego than to have your ex fall for you again only for you to ditch him because you have found a hopefully better man.