Universal have announced that the release date for Bridesmaids on DVD and Blu-ray will be September 20th, 2011.

Bridesmaids really is one of the winners of 2011. It opened to strong reviews (90% on Rotten Tomatoes) and is now one of the top five R-Rated comedies of all time having grossed $220 million at the worldwide box office. It also surpassed Knocked Up to become the top-grossing Judd Apatow production to date.

Here are the DVD/Blu-ray specifications:

EXCLUSIVE BLU-RAY^TM BONUS FEATURES:

• DIGITAL COPY: Viewers can redeem a digital version of the full-length movie to watch on an array of electronic and portable devices.
• GAG REEL (Blu-ray^TM Version)
• DELETED SCENES: Tons of deleted scenes, plus a never-before-seen “commercial” for Brynn and Gil’s
  Oo-Laka Juice.
• EXTENDED & ALTERNATE SCENES: Tons of extended and alternate scenes featuring the bridesmaids, the boyfriends, the roommates, Cholodecki’s employees and customers, and the hilarious “stolen” boot camp class.
• MADE OF HONOR: BEHIND THE SCENES OF BRIDESMAIDS: A behind-the-scenes “Making Of” the film featuring Maya Rudolph, Kristen Wiig, Rose Byrne, Melissa McCarthy, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Ellie Kemper, writer Annie Mumolo, director Paul Feig and producer Judd Apatow, among others.
• DRUNK-O-RAMA: Featuring Kristen Wiig’s greatest moments on the plane.
• PEP TALK: Featuring Kristen Wiig on the tennis court
• ANNIE VS. HELEN: A montage of Bridesmaids frenemies’ – Kristen Wiig’s “Annie” and Rose Byrne’s “Helen” – best and worst moments together.
• “HOLD ON:” Full song performance of Wilson Phillips’ hit “Hold On.”

• · BD-LIVE^™: Access the BD-Live™ Center through your Internet-connected player to watch exclusive content, the latest trailers and more!

• pocket BLU^™: The groundbreaking pocket BLU^™ app uses iPad^®, iPhone^®, iPod^® touch, Android^™, PC and Mac^® to work seamlessly with a network-connected Blu-ray^™ player. Plus iPad^® owners can enjoy a new, enhanced edition of pocket BLU^™ made especially to take advantage of the tablet’s larger screen and high resolution display. Consumers will be able to browse through a library of Blu-ray^™ content and watch entertaining extras on the go in a way that’s bigger and better than ever before. pocket BLU^™offers advanced features such as:
  • ADVANCED REMOTE CONTROL: A sleek, elegant new way to operate your Blu-ray^™ player. Users can navigate through menus, playback and BD-Live^™ functions with ease.
  • VIDEO TIMELINE: Users can easily bring up the video timeline, allowing them to instantly access any point in the film.
  • MOBILE-TO-GO: Users can unlock a selection of bonus content with their Blu-ray^™ discs to save to their device or to stream from anywhere there is a Wi-Fi network, enabling them to enjoy content on the go, anytime, anywhere.
  • BROWSE TITLES: Users will have access to a complete list of pocket BLU^™-enabled titles available and coming to Blu-ray^™ Hi-Def. They can view free previews and see what additional content is available to unlock on their device.
  • KEYBOARD: Entering data is fast and easy with your device’s intuitive keyboard.
• MY SCENES: Bookmark your favorite scenes from the film.
• uHEAR^™: Never miss another line of dialogue with this innovative feature that instantly skips back a few seconds on your Blu-ray^™ disc and turns on the subtitles to highlight what you missed.

BLU-RAY^TM AND DVD BONUS FEATURES

• · FEATURE COMMENTARY: With director Paul Feig, co-writer Annie Mumolo and cast members Kristen Wiig, Maya Rudolph, Melissa McCarthy, Wendi McClendon-Covey and Ellie Kemper.
• · GAG REEL (DVD Version)
  • · LINE-O-RAMA
  • · ADDITIONAL DELETED SCENES
  • · ADDITIONAL EXTENDED & ALTERNATE SCENES
    • · CHOLODECKI’S COMMERCIAL: Check out what’s new with Cholodecki’s when you watch the never-before-seen “commercial” from Annie’s jewelry employer!

You can pre-order Bridesmaids from Amazon by clicking the images below:

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Mark it down: 2011 is the year Kristen Wiig becomes a big-time Hollywood player. Greg Mottola’s Paul was a good stepping stone for the up-and-coming actress, giving her a strong supporting role, but Bridesmaids (which she also co-wrote) puts her where she belongs: front and center. This film is an instant classic; it’s charming, familiar yet slightly different, and – most importantly – hilarious. It’s a turning point in Wiig’s career, and after seeing her work here, I’m ready to see a Kristen Wiig comedy once a year for the next five.

Bridesmaids has been called a female version of The Hangover, but I think – and this may shock some of you – that this movie is actually funnier than Todd Phillips’ 2009 comedy. There’s a scene on a plane in Bridesmaids that I’d pit laugh-for-laugh against any comedy from the past few years, and if it didn’t win, I guarantee it’d at least hold its own. The reason it works so well is the characters feel like real people; Wiig and co-writer Annie Mumolo put a lot of care into crafting this script, almost certainly drawing from some real experiences to populate this universe with great moments that toe the line between the believable and the outlandish. The film adheres to a lot of romantic comedy conventions, but don’t let that scare you away – it never feels tired or boring. This is a rom-com for the Apatow crowd, and way heavier on the “com” than the “rom”.

Director Paul Feig seems a bit unsure of the pacing at the end of the second act, but this can be excused for a director who hasn’t worked much in film. (Feig cut his teeth directing episodes of some of my favorite shows: “Parks and Recreation”, “Arrested Development”, “The Office”, “Freaks and Geeks”, “30 Rock”, and “Mad Men” to name a few.) Visually, the movie looks about how you’d expect, and there’s no flashiness behind the camera here. He allows the cast (mostly women, a rarity in Hollywood these days) to take on the pressure of carrying the film, relying on performance over panache. It’s a wise decision; this is the type of movie that will age very well, thanks in no small part to the strong script and fantastic delivery from some of Hollywood’s emerging new talent.

Wiig is exceptional, a born leading lady. Both she and co-star Maya Rudolph are fairly well-known for their work on “Saturday Night Live”, and though both have dabbled in film before, neither one of them has been better (or funnier) than they are here. Ellie Kemper (Mystery Team, Erin from “The Office”) essentially plays a female version of Jack McBrayer’s sheltered character from another Apatow production, Forgetting Sarah Marshall. She has a tiny part, but she’s easy to watch. Rose Byrne is also making a bigger name for herself these days, and is great as Rudolph’s bitchy high class new friend.

As great as these cast members are, it’s Melissa McCarthy who absolutely steals the show. She plays Megan, one of the funniest characters in recent memory: a belching, foul-mouthed, sex-crazed force of nature. McCarthy is hysterical throughout the entire film, and she’s definitely someone to keep an eye on in the years to come. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if she got her own spin-off movie from this, kind of a parallel to Get Him to the Greek.

If none of the above convinces you to see Bridesmaids, there’s a musical cameo at the end that upstages Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle (that’s a huge hint, but I won’t spoil it directly). I’m fully expecting this to be one of the top comedies of 2011, so don’t miss out on this one. And if I haven’t made it clear enough to the gentlemen out there: despite some below-average trailers, if you’re a fan of the Apatow style of comedy, you’ll dig this. Until next time…

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Comedy is perhaps the most subjective of all film genres. It’s nearly impossible to create a film that is universally regarded as hilarious, so I would imagine filmmakers simply decide to make something that they themselves would find funny. I really enjoyed Nicholas Stoller’s debut feature film, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, so it stands to reason that I’d be excited for a spinoff featuring one of the funniest characters of that film, Russell Brand’s eccentric rock star Aldous Snow. But can the British comedian-turned actor hold an entire film on his own?

Aldous Snow (Brand) has fallen on some hard times since the release of his latest album “African Child,” hailed by the press as “the worst thing to happen to Africa since apartheid.” The bad reviews caused a rift with Snow’s successful model/singer girlfriend Jackie Q (Rose Byrne), so Snow has fallen off the wagon and returned to the drug-fueled escapades we saw in Sarah Marshall. Aaron Green (Hill) is a record company intern and a huge fan of Infant Sorrow, and pitches the idea for a reunion show to his boss, Sergio (Combs). Green is tasked with retrieving the eccentric rocker from England and getting him back to the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles in 72 hours.

Jason Segel is a co-producer on this film, but it lacks the charm and heart of Sarah Marshall, which Segel starred in and wrote. Stoller wrote and directed Get Him to the Greek and tries to recapture the sweetness that FSM had, but never quite achieves that goal. The characters aren’t as endearing and the comedy isn’t as organic. Even with a concept as ludicrous as a character going on a Hawaiian vacation and running into his ex-girlfriend at the same resort, Segel knew how to infuse Sarah Marshall with a reality that seemed believable and genuine; Get Him to the Greek plays like a gauntlet of events that the characters must barrel through to reach their final destination.

Sure, there are funny moments in this movie, and I’m not claiming that I didn’t enjoy it. But the pacing was so unbalanced I found it jarring at some points. Aldous Snow in particular experienced instantaneously wild swings of emotion that felt unnatural and poorly set up. It was the type of thing you’d find in a poor romantic comedy: shifts in emotion that are unjustified except in their ability to superficially progress the story. The film also occasionally falls into the Apatow formula of crass humor for the sake of being crass, which is something that I personally don’t find all that funny. Like I said, film is subjective.

To answer the question posed at the beginning of the review, I don’t think Aldous Snow’s character can hold an entire movie on his shoulders. Part of the reason everyone loved him in Sarah Marshall was because Segel knew how to show some restraint – by having Snow appear intermittently, the character’s wild actions were fresh and unexpected. Here, the film highlights his exploits and loses some of the surprise factor that made him so funny the first time around. Jonah Hill, whom I normally don’t care for, actually did some pretty good work here and played against type as the straight man to Snow’s drug-addled rocker. But with a premise like this, I don’t think the humor and drama ever found the right balance; the two leads deal with love interests and career choices in storylines that seem at odds with each other instead of complementing each other.

Elizabeth Moss (“Mad Men”) was believable as Green’s girlfriend Daphne, a nurse who works bizarre hours and wants to move the couple to Seattle so she can have better hours and spend more time with her boyfriend. They have a spat before Green takes off, and Daphne understandably doesn’t take kindly to his philandering with Snow. I won’t spoil it, but one of the film’s most uncomfortable scenes involves her character evening the score after Green returns to Los Angeles. Rose Byrne was quietly effective as Jackie Q, Snow’s ex-girlfriend. Her relationship with Aldous seemed to be the most realized of any on screen, and although I wish we could have seen a bit more of her, I appreciated the outcome of their situation.

Sean Combs was surprisingly funny as the overblown record executive, but the rest of the supporting cast was criminally underused. Comedians Aziz Ansari and Nick Kroll were featured in only one scene and easily could have been utilized in various points throughout the film. Kristen Bell’s cameo was expectedly short but, as much as I love her, kind of uninspired. I appreciated the random appearance from Ricky Schroder (Poolhall Junkies), but thought they could have done a bit more with Bell’s character.

I dug the first half of the film, but it fell apart in the third act with strained storyline conclusions and a pretty typical ending. The comedy also got weirder as the movie progressed, featuring a lot of “humor” revolving around Jonah Hill’s rectum. Yeah, it was disturbing, and sometimes disturbing things are funny, but those sequences didn’t do anything for me. I much preferred the “2 Fast 2 Furious” scene, with its non sequiturs and escalation that reminded me of that famous brawl in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy.

Get Him to the Greek lacks the soul of Forgetting Sarah Marshall, but it’s still worth a watch on DVD or Blu-ray when its released. It’s relatively harmless, but didn’t live up to my (admittedly too high) expectations. What did you think of it? Leave your comments below.

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Alright, folks! I was told by Liam, my fierce English Editor that Funny People, Judd Apatow’s third directorial effort, doesn’t hit the UK until much later even though it opened here last weekend. What does that mean for you Europeans? It means I still have time to save you the price of a ticket by reviewing Funny People.

Funny People is a long film, about 150 minutes long, and commits the cardinal sin of a movie with such a length: it feels that long.

I see a lot of movies, some in the theater, some on TV pay channels and some streamed to my computer through the magic of the internet. In the month of July, I somehow avoided seeing horrible movies, which had started to concern me. “What if I’ve lost all critical perspective and lowered my bar by actually enjoying Transformers 2, never again to be trustworthy or insightful?,” I selfishly thought to myself. Good news: I didn’t like Funny People, which means I have re-calibrated my critical barometer.

Then again, just trashing the movie for no apparent reason doesn’t make any sense, so I suppose I should back up my claim that Funny People isn’t worth your 150 minutes.

Funny People is the story of fictional comedian George Simmons, played by Adam Sandler because Simmons essentially IS Adam Sandler. George used to be a comedian until he became a studio whore making movies like Re-Do where he’s trapped in the body of an infant or Merman where he is a MerMan. The film even starts off with home videos of Sandler shot by Apatow when the two used to live together. It’s an odd thing to mix real Sandler with fictional Simmons they way Apatow does, because Funny People is a big studio movie directed by hot-shit-Apatow with Apatow-golden-boy Seth Rogen in it featuring cameos by real-life comedians. At some point in the film, you’ll notice that people talk about George Simmons and your brain hears “Adam Sandler.” The guy was everywhere in the late 90s and early 00s, mostly making the kind of crap he’s now apologizing for with this thin “character.”

Simmons gets Acute Myeloid Leukemia, a rare cancerous blood disease I wrote an after-school special about once. Safe to say it’s horrible and can kill you fast. When Sandler decides to go back-to-basics and do more stand up, he hires Ira Wright (Rogen) oblivious when Ira screws his roommate (Jonah Hill as Leo) out of a co-writing gig. Sandler asks for both Ira and Leo, but Ira never makes the offer to his friend, coveting the job for himself because he is a lesser comedian and hasn’t been able to pay rent at the apartment he shares with Leo and Jason Schwartzman’s Mark.

Sandler tells Ira that he’s dying but asks the young comedian to keep it to himself and write some jokes for him.

That is the first movie in Funny People, a film that is actually two movies squished into one premise. The first half of the film is a portrait of the lives of famous comedians juxtaposed against the lives of up-and-coming comedians struggling to get work so they don’t have to serve cold cuts at the local deli.

The second movie in Funny People starts when Sandler tries to re-connect with the love of his life Laura (played by Leslie Mann) who left Sandler when he cheated on her and ran off to marry an Australian businessman Clarke (played by Eric Bana). When Laura thinks Sandler is dying, they re-connect, then Sandler is cured but Laura still thinks she’s in love with him. When Clarke returns from a business trip early, Ira and Sandler are stuck in Laura’s house with Laura’s family as Sandler attempts to steal Clarke’s wife out from under him and his daughters (the Apatow girls, a pleasure as always).

Yes, it’s a very unexpected and abrupt change in plot and tone, but this is Judd Apatow’s “death” movie. His first directorial effort, The 40 Year Old Virgin, dealt with love and sexual innocence. Steve Carrell played that part with enough aw-shucks and childish glee that it worked and played well to a young audience. Knocked Up was Apatow’s way of bringing his Freaks & Geeks mentality into adulthood by having Rogen’s stoner slacker learn responsibility the old fashioned way: by putting his baby up in someone. This film advances Apatow’s themes a bit further. All the characters are trying to make something of themselves (something Virgin and Knocked Up’s leads weren’t doing) and get cut short by questions of mortality.

I can see the appeal in doing a story about death with comedians at the center, but the film doesn’t really work that way. On the outside it seems great: would you rather talk death with a comedian or Al Pacino (with his needless yelling of late)? But the truth of the matter is much more sinister, because anyone who knows comedians will tell you that they are the most profoundly unhappy people you will ever meet. Sandler’s character sums it up best in one of his monologues where he says that he’s been trying to make his Dad laugh all his life and he had to be funny because you have to bring the jokes right before the old man beats the shit out of you. Funny people, REAL funny people not these Funny People, are the product of tragedy. A sense of humor is a survival technique for overweight children and social outcasts. As far as my opinion goes, that’s what kills the movie:

None of these characters are likable.

I can’t feel sorry that someone who was given everything through the trappings of fame is going to die, and I certainly don’t want to listen to 150 minutes of complaining if I think that person is a waste of space. And by the time the movie does decide to end, no one has really changed. They are all the same sad assholes we started the movie with.

I will now tell you why each character is a dick that doesn’t deserve to have a movie based around them.

George Simmons (Adam Sandler): The guy knowingly tricks star-fuckers into having sex with him, lives in a huge house with a large and faceless staff, treats Ira like crap, can’t actually emote to anyone and is SO selfish that he tries to break-apart Laura’s family without any thought of her kids and life. Worst of all, he ends that snafu by blaming Ira. Maybe it’s that Sandler has profoundly annoyed me with everything after “Piece Of Shit Car,” but if Adam Sandler were to really be diagnosed with cancer, I think we’d all agree that his great contributions to comedy are behind him.

Ira Wright (Seth Rogen): Not only does the guy refuse to share his job with his much funnier roommate, but his love story with female comedian Daisy (Aubrey Plaza) consists of two scenes of arguing and one scene of a SINGLE kiss. I understand this guy wants to be a comedian real bad and doesn’t want to work at the deli to make ends meet, but HEY that’s life, Ira. Suck it up. There’s also a part that barely gets referenced where Ira takes credit for one of Leo’s jokes. Joke thief as well? Usually Rogen’s characters have some degree of nerdy likeability to them, but Ira is a doormat until the last 10 minutes of the film. I wanted to slap him around several times in this movie (and even more so in the second movie squeezed into this movie).

Laura (Leslie Mann): Not only is Laura a bitch the first time we see her on screen, but she glows red like she just got a chemical peel when we see her again. Outside of this being Leslie Mann’s worst role in one of her husband’s movies, Laura is a miserable portrait of a woman. She’s the pivotal character in the film’s tonal switch, because when she shows up the film stops being a mediocre comedy and begins being something resembling a mid-life crisis drama. She’s ready to kick her husband out of the house and move her kids to LA so she can re-start her acting career and somehow never manages to see through George’s exterior to notice that he’s not a family person.

Clarke (Eric Bana): Bana works his ass off in this role. At first we’re supposed to hate him, then we’re supposed to sympathize with him, then he’s supposed to make us feel better about his home life just in time for the movie to end. He tries, he tries so hard. But – again – his character ends up right back where he was at the beginning of the movie when the credits roll thanks to some sudden “karma” lines that are supposed to make everyone forget they’re all traumatizing his kids.

There’s one good character in the film, and that’s Eminem as himself. He tells Sandler that death was George’s way out of the lifestyle his stardom has brought about. Hearing those words come out of Eminem’s stoic mug rung true. If the film’s overall message had a face, it’s that of Marshall Mathers: You may be successful, but no one is ever actually happy and no one can change.

What happened, Judd? This movie is populated with characters I couldn’t root for. The title promised comedy, but only delivered for the first 30 minutes. Everyone was the same at the end of the film (you might say Sandler had changed, but we never saw him cancer-free, so how will we know that?). It’s just a mess that has been assembled into a movie thanks to Apatow’s talent. The guy knows how to shoot a film and whatnot, but Jesus, this movie made me sad.

Judd Apatow films are usually comedies with a very real heart to them, but in Funny People that heart has been replaced by cameos and meta-humor. Then, about half-way through the heart dies and we’re challenged to root for either the selfish asshole trying to break apart a family or the cheating, borderline neglectful husband who is still an asshole, but a different kind.

What the hell?

What. The. Hell.

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Aziz Ansari is a funny dude I first discovered when he used to do a show called Crash Test at the UCB theater in New York. The guy had a “Shittiest Mix Tape Challenge” where he challenged his roommate to make the shittiest mix tape possible. The loser had to walk around New York with a boom box blasting the horribleness. Aziz lost and the video was hilarious.

Since then, Ansari has scored himself a part in NBC’s Parks & Recreation and a part in Judd Apatow’s Funny People, where he plays a comedian named Randy who performs by hopping around, spitting catch-phrases and using samples from a DJ.

Funny People has been virally promoting itself around the web (American readers can, and should, check out faux-sitcom Yo Teach! on Hulu), and Raaaaaaaandy made his web debut on LaughYourDickOff.com where you can see some of Randy’s stand up, play with a sound board and read about his jumping.

Funny Or Die has now uploaded the first part in a documentary about Randy in promotion of Funny People at the end of the month.

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It’s been four years since The 40 Year Old Virgin had everyone talking about the return of the R-rated comedy. Two years ago, I accidentally took a date to Knocked Up, not expecting to actually have a conversation about my personal habits that didn’t make me “father material.” Judd Apatow has since spawned comedies from Seth Rogan and Jason Segel, bringing the term “bromance” to the forefront the modern adult comedy cinema vernacular.

And all it took was Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox story for people to start doubting, those doubters and their doubting doubts.

Well, doubt no more, because Apatow is back and in a decision that threw me at first, he’s brought Adam Sandler back with him. Yes, Adam Sandler, who I swore off after I Pronounce You Chuck And Larry turned out to be the most offensive and pointless thing I’ve seen in theaters in all my years of film-going. Don’t Mess With The Zohan wasn’t my cup of tea, but it was the first Sandler project that Apatow’s name popped up on (Judd got a writing credit).

Now, we have Funny People, Apatow’s directorial follow up to Knocked Up. It’s described thusly: When seasoned comedian George Simmons (Sandler) learns of his terminal, inoperable health condition, his desire to form a genuine friendship cause him to take a relatively green performer (Rogen) under his wing as his opening act.

That doesn’t even mention that Jonah Hill, Leslie Mann, Eric Bana, RZA, Aziz Ansari, Jason Schwartzman, and some comedians appearing as themselves (Sarah Silverman, Andy Dick) will be appearing to bring their funny.

To me, the Red Band trailer manages to be funny while keeping the subtle undertones of the mortality drama this flick could have become. Did it work for you as well?

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Apatow & Co. are at it again! Nick Stoller, director of Forgetting Sarah Marshall, has just sold the rights to Get Him to the Greek to Universal. The premise of the new flick?

A fresh-out-of-college insurance adjuster is hired to accompany an out-of-control rock star from London to a gig at L.A.’s Greek Theater.

Judd is producing, Nick will be direct, and Jonah Hill and Russell Brand will star!

Let’s hope it’s as good as Sarah Marshall (I’ll fight you on this one, Deena, I swear I will!)…!!!

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