Philadelphia Weekly

It would be a lot easier for Peter to forget Sarah Marshall if he didn't keep seeing her everywhere. But I guess that's what happens when you've just been dumped by a famous television personality.

Sarah's the star of one of those high-rated forensics investigation shows, the kind where the male lead says cheesy one-liners and keeps taking his sunglasses off and on all the time. So everywhere poor Peter turns, his ex's smiling face is there to greet him on billboards, reruns, Access Hollywood interviews--until finally the poor schlub up and runs off to Hawaii, where he finds himself trapped in the same tropical resort as ... you guessed it ... Sarah Marshall.

It's a bit of a stretch, but a nifty hook nonetheless for this filthy, winning comedy, the latest from producer Judd Apatow's seemingly inexhaustible well of relatably schlubby guys, impossibly hot women and wildly embarrassing sexual shenanigans.

Jason Segel, who also penned the screenplay, stars as Peter. You might know him as the adorable sidekick lummox from Apatow's short-lived Freaks and Geeks, or maybe from his current stint as the adorable sidekick lummox on How I Met Your Mother. Segel's got an interesting screen presence, as he's a good deal taller and a little bit doughier than most leading men, but he approaches every scene with a wide-eyed, almost childlike enthusiasm. His specialty is the absence of snark, making his absolute sincerity somehow hilarious.

It's this peculiar earnestness that allows Forgetting Sarah Marshall to somehow get away with being the dirtiest movie in theaters right now--you haven't seen anything so raunchy since Superbad. And yet for all the full frontal male nudity and discussions about the elusive mysteries of the clitoris, you'll never forget this is the sweet story of a broken heart, as the giant goofball Segel bumbles his way along the beach, often sobbing so loudly that the hotel receives complaints about a woman crying in his suite.

In keeping with the Apatow factory's specialty, Sarah Marshall also serves as an empowerment fantasy for couch potatoes. Of course the Hawaiian hotel's concierge Rachel (Mila Kunis) isn't just ridiculously gorgeous and unattached, she also takes an instant liking to our weepy hero, believing in his dreams of writing a rock opera about Dracula, to be performed by puppets. (A "more gothic Neil Diamond" is the sound Peter's going for.)

The smartest thing about Segel's script is its spirit of generosity. This resort is stuffed silly with colorful characters, each offered plenty of screen time to shine. There's Paul Rudd's zonked surfing instructor, so cheerfully stoned he's prone to repeating entire conversations. 30 Rock's overzealous page Jack McBrayer turns up as a woefully out-of-his-league honeymooner, discovering that marital relations aren't everything they were cracked up to be in Sunday school. Davon McDonald's bartender is full of surprises, and it wouldn't be an Apatow production without Jonah Hill turning up somewhere, offering his patented mix of potty-mouthed bluster and latent homosexuality. Even the dreaded ex Sarah Marshall herself (Kristen Bell) is treated a lot more gently than one might expect.

But the true stroke of genius is in the writing of Sarah's new boyfriend Aldous Snow, played astoundingly well by British comic Russell Brand. At first an annoying over-the-top caricature of a preening pop star, Aldous' comical hair extensions and anthropological mix-and-match tattoos soon cease to distract, as Brand makes his entitled loutishness weirdly charming. The film's funniest scenes find Peter and Aldous striking up an unlikely friendship, throwing a few curveballs into the usual rom-com formula. ("Fuck," Segel groans, "why do you have to be so cool?")

Capably if unexceptionally directed by Nicholas Stoller with a few too many distracting blue-screens standing in for island scenery, Forgetting Sarah Marshall meanders a bit before building to a climax that offers more gentle smiles than straight-up belly laughs. But that spirit of affection is what lingers when the lights come up. It's a pleasure spending time with these people, which is a rare enough feeling to have at a movie these days.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

B+
Director: Nicholas Stoller
Starring: Jason Segel
Opens Fri., April 18