I Love You, Man (Blu-ray)

The cast and crew of I Love You, Man constantly refer to the film as a “bromance”. I’m not exactly sure what they mean by that, but I was actually pretty pleased with the clever turn on the typically droll romantic comedy. Maybe someone’s finally come up with a romantic comedy that actually can appeal to men. Whatever you call it, I Love You, Man is a bit of a refreshing take on today’s innuendo comedy. Writer/director John Hamburg has turned a pretty inane idea into a rather funny little comedy that just might be the compromise between a chick flick and something we won’t have to squirm in our seats just to make our dates happy. You know, to make up for all of those Clint Eastwood/Bruce Willis action flicks that have the same effect on most of the women as romantic comedies have on the guys. A hybrid is born. And it kind of works.

Peter Klaven (Rudd) has just proposed to his long time girlfriend, Zooey (Jones). She’s terribly excited and immediately wants to call her best friends to share the news. Peter is quickly uncomfortable with how much intimate information her friends seem to have. It hits home with him that he doesn’t really have any close friends to share the good news with. Apparently, Peter’s always been a better “girlfriend” and buddy friend. With an impending wedding and no one to fill the best man shoes, he sets out to make a close friend. Predictably, the results are some pretty wild and funny moments. One of his prospects mistakes his attention as a gay pass, and he ends up throwing up on another. All the while he’s trying to sell Lou Ferrigno’s house to make enough money to buy his own dream piece of property. At first Zooey encourages the friendship hunt, and Peter finally meets Sydney Fife (Segel) at one of Ferrigno’s open houses. He’s immediately attracted to Sydney’s brutal open honesty and unwillingness to put on pretenses. The two discover they share a few things in common. Both are garage band musicians with a hero worship for the band Rush. Before long they have become inseparable, and suddenly Zooey is getting jealous of Peter’s new best friend. Together they go through the ups and downs of making the many relationships work.

The plot is rather silly and honestly doesn’t appear to have much potential. But Hamburg does a great job of not taking himself or the film all that seriously. There’s obviously a ton of adlibs in the film, and Hamburg has the good sense to just let the film happen. Both Paul Rudd and Jason Segel resist the temptation to take it over the top, instead letting the absurdity of the various situations take over. Lou Ferrigno does a fine job in a role that is pretty much a parody of himself. He’s really got to be sick of the Hulk jokes by now, but he allows them to happen good-naturedly, all the same. Jane Curtin and J.K. Simmons play Peter’s parents. Hell, I thought Jane Curtin was dead, but it turns out that was really just her career. She does a good job of sticking to the background here and letting Simmons get all the good lines and sight gags. Jon Favreau comes down from his Iron Man success long enough to get thrown up on. It’s all in good fun.

Look, I’m not going to pretend the film doesn’t have any problems, and I’m not suggesting it’ll go down as a classic comedy. Truth be told, we’ll all have forgotten about it in a couple of years. But, for a rainy night rental you might give this one a try when that battle of the sexes kicks in and you can’t decide between an action flick and a romantic comedy. Settle in for a “Bromantic Comedy” instead.

Video

I Love You, Man is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1. The 1080p image is arrived at with an AVC/MPEG-4 VC-1 codec. This just isn’t one of those jump out of your seat high definition benchmark films. It’s strictly a catalog title that happens to make its way onto Blu-ray. Colors go for the complete natural look here. Black levels are a little better than average, and the print is in great shape. What else are you really looking for with this kind of a film, anyway?

Audio

The Dolby TrueHD Audio track doesn’t need to do all that much. This is a very dialog driven film. here aren’t really much in the way of ambient sounds or f/x. The surrounds really just help to spread out the catchy tunes that dominate the film’s score. Again, there really isn’t a whole lot to this kind of film that makes it stand out with an uncompressed audio presentation. Consider it a little bit of a bonus and pretty much ignore it.

There is an Audio Commentary with Jason Segel, Paul Rudd, and Hamburg. They clown around a lot, and it’s a very entertaining track.

Special Features

The features appear to all be in HD.

The Making Of I Love You, Man: (17:29) Plenty of the typical behind the scenes material featuring interview clips and the usual story summary and character descriptions. Favreau brags about the ton of money that Iron Man made.

Extras: (22:25) I have to admit I found this rather lame. It’s one of those features where we hear various takes on the same line that were tried over and over again.

Extended Scenes: (12:39) There are 6 in all, and you can watch them individually or through the play all option.

Deleted Scenes: (3:18) Only 3 that really add nothing new.

Gag Reel: (11:25) A little long unless you really get into these things

Final Thoughts:

If more romantic comedies were like this one, my job would be so much easier. There’s a credit scene that takes place at the wedding reception. It’s more cutting up. Rush makes a pretty cool appearance in the film as well. Forgettable? Yes. But it’s also a little fun as well. Oh, and “it sounds better on big speakers”.