SEX TAPE Written by Kate Angelo, Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller Directed by Jake Kasdan Starring Cameron Diaz, Jason Segel and Rob Lowe Jay: Look at us! We send the kids off to Grandma’s house and make some porn!
As I am sure you’re well aware, sex can be a terribly awkward experience at times. That said, I’ve never had sex that is anywhere near as awkward as watching SEX TAPE is. Cameron Diaz and Jason Segel reteam with the director of BAD TEACHER, Jake Kasdan, all good things in my mind, but they never find their footing here, which makes for some very sloppy, very messy filmmaking. There are some good laughs to be had from time to time, but when the sex is this bad, sometimes laughing your way through it is the only way to get through it.
When we first meet Jay and Annie (Segel and Diaz), they are college kids. Well, they are supposed to be. They look just like they do today but they tell us they’re younger so I guess they are. We are then treated to a montage of their intense and frequent lovemaking, which I’m not sure anyone really ever wanted to see. All that fornicating led to marriage and a baby very young and the subsequent fear that they will never have sex like this again in their lives. Of course their worries become a reality and years later, they need to schedule sex just to make sure it happens, which it usually doesn’t anyway. So, as they face the fact that they may never have sex again, they decide to go all out and make a 3-hour sex tape, wherein they reenact a number of positions from “The Joy of Sex”.
Jay is supposed to erase the movie the next day but, spoiler, he doesn’t, and before he knows it, his incredibly complicated synching system has uploaded his sexcapade to the ever elusive cyber space known as the cloud. As he gives out used iPads as gifts every time he upgrades to the newest version (must be nice!), a good chunk of his friends and family now have access to view his sex tape, which displeases Annie a great deal for some reason. They spend the next 24 hours trying desperately to reclaim the iPads before people see them in all their naked splendour. They could have remotely erased all the content, which the film even points out at one point, but then there would be no movie. Their evening leads to some exciting moments (any scene involving Rob Lowe is pure gold) but any momentum they actually had going loses all its steam after the first act, which takes all the thrust out of this romp.
SEX TAPE is a bit boggling to my mind. It seems to me that this movie should have been made a long time ago. In fact, to a large extent, it doesn’t really make any sense in today’s technologically advanced world, and to another extent, you can tell that Kasdan and friends are aware of this on some level. As a result, the film feels forced, like they’re trying far too hard to make the premise relevant. Diaz and Segel are great together and they make this film about as watchable as it ever could be because they are naturally funny, both separate and together, but you can tell after a few short minutes that this sex (tape) is not going to be anywhere near mind blowing. You may even find yourself drifting and thinking about what you need to do after it’s all done, which is not a good sign when it comes to anything sex related.
Your turn!
How many sheep would you give Sex Tape?
[kkstarratings]