Funny People

Writer-director-producer Judd Apatow's third directorial effort, "Funny People," may not be his funniest movie, following on the heels of "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" and "Knocked Up." However, and more interestingly, it is his best film, deep and rich and unexpectedly honest while still being remarkably funny. Apatow's still Apatow, of course; the last person I can think of as obsessed with "d---" was Captain Ahab, and that was a different thing altogether. Also, "Funny People" is a longish two hours and 20 minutes. But as with every other Apatow film, the fat is the flavor, and "Funny People" is remarkably well-marbled. You could cut a few moments here and there, but the end result wouldn't be nearly as good, surprisingly good, as the film on-screen.

"Funny People" opens with megabucks comedian George Simmons (Adam Sandler) waking up in a big, beautiful, empty house, watching clips of his younger days and surrounded by posters for high-concept, low-IQ movies like "Re-Do" (where his character is transformed into a baby with an adult's head) and "Merman" (which is fairly self-explanatory). But George doesn't seem happy, and it would be one thing if George were the kind of clown who's crying on the inside. But George is actually the kind of clown who's dying on the inside; blood cancer's killing him, and the low odds of experimental treatments helping him aren't good. George has money, but he doesn't have much time.

Ira Wright (Seth Rogen) has time but no money. He's honing his stand-up act whenever he can, working at a supermarket deli to pay the bills, and crashing on the pull-out couch of his much more successful friend Mark (Jason Schwartzman). One night, at an open mic, George catches Ira's act, and hires him to write jokes and fetch things, but, it soon becomes apparent to Ira and us, really more to be around than anything else. George is using Ira, and Ira is using him right back.

And that bluntness (about show business, about ambition, about sex) is part of what makes "Funny People" funny, and a big part of what makes it good. Everyone in it is capable of being a fairly horrible human being, from George's privileged bullying to Ira's passive-aggressive acceptance of it. Schwartzman's character, the lead on a fairly horrible looking sitcom called "Yo, Teach!," keeps leaving his paycheck lying around where his struggling roommates Rogen and Jonah Hill can see it. And as George interacts with real luminaries from the world of comedy and show business (including several cameos too good to spoil, and the greatest-ever soundtrack cliché gag ever committed to film), we glimpse that just because he is dying doesn't make him a good person. George even reaches out to his ex, Laura (Leslie Mann), who loved him before he became famous and left him years ago for being a jerk. And she forgives him, because that's what you do when someone's going to die, and she refuses to let him off the hook, because that's what you do when you love someone. ("Why did you cheat on me, George?" "Because I was an idiot. ...")

But, as the trailers make clear, it then turns out George isn't going to die. And things get much more interesting and much more complicated, especially as he's talking Leslie into leaving her hateful, hearty businessman husband Clarke (Eric Bana). There are two big, easy outs "Funny People" could take in its second half, and it refuses to take either. In fact, the film never even takes any tiny outs, expressing love and loathing for show business in the same breath.

Having Sandler play a wealthy comedian given to idiotic films is hardly a stretch, but Rogen actually impresses as a striving, struggling stand-up. (As his co-worker Doug, played by RZA, asks him, early on, "How can you be in show business when you got no business to show?") Plenty of people are already comparing "Funny People" to the comedy-dramas of James L. Brooks ("Terms of Endearment," "Broadcast News"). But to me it felt more like -- and this is a compliment -- Apatow's Cameron Crowe film. Like "Almost Famous," it's about creative art as a money-making enterprise; like "Jerry Maguire," it's about the challenge of being a good person in private and in public, and how much work that can take.

"Funny People" is shot by Janusz Kaminski ("Munich," "Minority Report"), and while it looks great, it also looks right, nailing Los Angeles from the mansions of Malibu to the sunburnt streets of Silver Lake. And, yes, the film would be too long if it were merely about funny ha-ha people, but it's actually about funny peculiar people, the self-loathing, self-celebrating men and women of show business, and the rest of us in this strange and wicked world. And by the time we've gotten to the film's final scene, with one single selfless act shown offhand, the first selfless act we've seen that character make, Apatow's movie has moved from penis jokes and gags and into the realm of real drama, getting past the smiles and the smirks on its character's faces to really look at their heads and their hearts in a rough, real way. Is "Funny People" funny? Yes, but it's also honest and true. Not only is "Funny People" so funny it hurts, but it also hurts so much (in offhand, brilliant ways, with small-but-sharp insights) that all you can do is laugh.

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