The Five-Year Engagement follows Tom (Segel) and Violet (Blunt), two likeable young lovers who plan to tie the knot when Tom proposes one year after they first meet. As the wedding plans begin to take shape, a spanner is thrown in the works when Violet lands a dream job in Michigan, prompting the couple to postpone the wedding and uproot from San Francisco.
While Violet fits in perfectly with her new surroundings, Tom’s lack of job prospects creates another in a seemingly endless list of obstacles that make their wedding less and less likely with each passing month. As months turn into years, Tom and Violet’s relationship is put to the test as their epic engagement turns into a living nightmare.
Remember when great comedies were short? Annie Hall, Airplane, Ernest Goes to Camp? They all clock in around the 90-minute mark, and frankly, they didn’t need to be any longer. Somebody needs to remind Judd Apatow that minutes don’t make the movie, especially in the comedy arena, where his painfully long Funny People proved that stretching a comedy out to 146 minutes is, if anything, sincerely unfunny.
Though Judd’s in the producer’s chair for The Five-Year Engagement, this is typical Apatow cannon fodder: overlong, a little self-satisfied and boasting a curious mix of cynicism and romance. The problem is, unlike Forgetting Sarah Marshall (a former Apatow/Segel/Stoller outing), The Five-Year Engagement isn’t all that funny. Segel is as watchable as ever, but there’s little chemistry between the two leads, and even less comic timing.
Perhaps the biggest disappointment in The Five-Year Engagement though is its irksome predictability. Dumbass best friends, shitty bosses, gross fat blokes and an inevitable finale contribute to the film’s flabbiness.
But then, any film that casts Rhys Ifans as the smooth, suave threat to the relationship is never going to be a winner.
Overall Verdict: A disappointingly flimsy effort out of the Apatow cannon.
Reviewer: Lee Griffiths