Film Review | Sex Tape

sL Star Rating: ★★★

Annie (Cameron Diaz) and Jay (Jason Segel) have been happily married for some time now. But living a happily married life isn’t the same as having a happy and active sex life. When they find themselves in a rut in that particular level of intimacy, a night of passion turns into a night of possible permanent public humiliation. With Annie’s prospects of an awesome job on the line, will Jay have what it takes to save both their reputations and their marriage?

The Story

This film opens with flashbacks of the evolution of Jay and Annie’s sex life via Annie’s narration as she blogs. The premise of the film is the struggle of keeping the fire alive after children enter the picture. This evolution sees Jay and Annie go from a burning bush to a dwindling flame and eventually, ashes of the campfire. The trouble begins when Annie and Jay try to revers the clock by lighting a match and throwing it into the ashes when they record themselves making love. But instead of bursting into gentle flames, they spark a bushfire as Jay forgets to delete the video. In a panic to save their reputation – and Annie’s career prospects – the couple set out to erase their video from estranged iPads given to friends, family and the mailman. But with a mysteriously conniving “text-assassin” is thrown into the mix, the stakes rise to a whole new level.

I personally thought that the movie opens and closes very boldly in the sense that it was borderline pornographic – but of course you’d expect that from a film titled “Sex Tape”. Yet, regardless of how it starts and ends, I thought the in between was realistic in its portrayal of the loss of passion after the your marital status goes from “husband and wife” to “mum and dad”. As the film progresses, you know, just much as Annie and Jay do, that a sex tape won’t fix the bigger issue; you feel for the couple both in their endeavour to reignite their passion and in their pains as they go through damage control.

As the two go about their demolition hunt, and have their true feelings about the issue come out into the open in the process, other elements come into the mix that have you laughing and cringing along with the characters. I enjoyed how writers, Kate Angelo, Nicholas Stoller and Segel himelf, portrayed a marriage that was strong but not getting the much needed intimacy – both through verbal communication and sexual passion – through the business that comes with life, rather than just focussing on the fact that Jay and Annie haven’t ‘done it’ in a while. I also loved portrayals of other couples and their marriages along with how children shake up their previous lives. These dynamics are then used as set-ups for twists that occur later on in the film. I also thought the interlocking of the porn-industry was very clever. I particularly loved that they don’t make excuses for the industry, but instead make a powerful statement about why it exist.

The Cast

Cameron Diaz and Jason Segel carry their chemistry from Bad Teacher straight into this film. There is no denying that they completely compliment one another in both the comedic aspects as well as the more serious elements of the film. There’s an ease to their exchange in dialogue and their physical theatre – especially with the endeavours that they attempt for this film.

Rod Corddry and Ellie Kemper heighten the comedic element of the film as they produce even more comic relief beside the existing quips delivered by Diaz and Segel. The four of them support each other so well that you can believe that they are the perfect couple-friends that will go through everything and anything together – even if it meant you couldn’t look at them in the eye ever again.

Overall

Although I thought the story was well written, I thought there were a lot of risqué scenes in this film. I do acknowledge that this film gives a fair warning with its title, nevertheless, I really don’t think they needed to show us some of the snippets from the actual sex tape that was created – not just because they were borderline vulgar, but the angles were unrealistic if the iPad was propped from a single position (no innuendo intended) and the video was unedited. This film is definitely and adults only film. Although the film has a family unit, it is in no way G-rated – so do not watch this with children under the age of eighteen present in the room.

Next on sL: Hercules