Crazy, Stupid, Love.

In theaters Friday: Conan the Barbarian, Fright Night, One Day, Spy Kids: All the Time in the World in 4D

New on DVD/Blu-ray: Jane Eyre, Something Borrowed, Priest

As a huge fan of The Office—even when some uppity friends chided me for accepting the American version when the English original was obviously much better—I’ve seen every film Emmy-winner Steve Carell made while on summer hiatus from the hit NBC comedy. If I had not seen each of these, I may have enjoyed Carell’s latest even more. But I have seen those movies—and just about every Daily Show skit Carell made a decade ago— in some cases several times, and it is clear that a pinch of Dan in Real Life, a shot of Date Night and a long, stiff pour of The 40-Year-Old Virgin makes for the comedic cocktail that is Crazy, Stupid, Love.

Carell is okay in his typically nerdy schlub way, but he brings nothing new that audiences haven’t already seen from him before. Still, a quirky supporting cast and a whirling, multi-threaded screenplay that, thankfully, kept me off-balance just enough to make the typical romantic comedy tropes on full display a lot easier to swallow, turn the film into a good, if not great, summer comedy confection.

Crazy, Stupid, Love is a tale of two movies, one staring Carell and th other staring Ryan Gosling. When Carell’s wife, played by Julianne Moore, confesses to cheating on him and asks for a divorce, the middle-aged dad of three passively hits this skids. Instead of staying and fighting for his wife, he slinks off defeated. After days of drowning his sorrows at a chic nightclub, Carell meets Gosling’s smooth-talking, GQ-ready playboy. Gosling takes pity on Carell and vows to transform him from zero to hero with a new wardrobe and a renewed confidence that will make his estranged wife regret ever cheating on him.

Gosling and Carell’s odd couple act is completely likable. They work well together when their opposing worldviews cause enough comedic friction to wash over the divorce drama of the first few scenes and really make this movie fun. As Carell gains confidence and catches his wife’s eye again, Gosling’s chauvinistic lothario life gets rattled, just when Carell needs him the most, in the form of a young law student played by Emma Stone. Gosling falls hard for her and changes his tomcat ways on a dime.

As Carell leaves the club scene to win his wife back, Gosling is forced to clean up his act to impress Stone’s parents. They both need each other’s help, and with a big third act twist that puts both of their romances on the line, they get it and a whole lot more.

Again Stone proves herself a modern-day Diane Keaton, and there is a stretch of conversation between her and Gosling that plays out like the best of Cameron Crowe’s relationship dramas. Like Keaton’s iconic roles of the ‘70s and ‘80s, Stone is quirky and honest in a way that is relatable and constantly endearing. Gosling adds dramatic layers and shade to a character that could easily be one-note in the hands of a more traditional comedic actor. In his post-Blue Valentine rush, 2011 is shaping up to be a breakout year for the actor with Drive and The Ides of March coming soon this fall. Gosling is slowly embracing the mainstream and realizing he can smartly step out of his arthouse comfort zone on occasion to create a more diverse and more viewed body of work. I just hope Carell has a similar revelation, because while I enjoyed Crazy, Stupid, Love., it feels curiously like the end of the line.