Jason Segel and Cameron Diaz have never been married. Not to each other, not to other people.
I don’t mean to report that in a “TMZ-ish: Who they f’n now” sort of way. I personally don’t care. I wish them both a 100 lovers and a 1000 orgasms.
The reason I bring their marital status into the review is because they play a married couple in Sex Tape and it isn’t believable for a second. They both are merely playing the part and the movie suffers for it. Sure, they have comedic chemistry but you don’t believe they know the slightest notion about marriage. They are just riffing on one convention of marriage. The myth/conception that once you are married, you never have sex again. The truth is really: You don’t have sex that often. But when you do, watch out. You better cover everything in plastic like you’re going to a Gallagher show.
This is the one note strummed again and over again. No sex. Not if you’re married, bub. You want to have sex but you can’t, you know, because you’re married and married people don’t have sex. Because you can’t. This is all that is discussed during the entire first act. Any topic that deviates serves as only foreshadow: Segel gives away iPads (?) and Diaz may sell her mommy blog to a toy company fixated on wholesomeness and pineapple slices.
Once they talk about not having sex for about 30 minutes, ironicaly they have sex and (you guessed it there, Sherlock) film it. Segel accidently sends it to the many iPads he constantly hands out to all friends and family and chaos ensues.
To coincide with the weak premise, Sex Tape sadly doesn’t deliver many laughs. It’s easy to see the film’s intent but it never really gets to where it wants to be. There is a 10 minute segment smack in the middle involving a pissed off dog, Rob Lowe and some blaring Slayer tunes that is hilarious and inspired but the film never hits that level again.
I’m a big fan of Jason Segel and he co-wrote this with his usual creative buddy, Nick Stoller but they were working from a pre-existing script that they merely pulled a re-write on. Very little of their normal wit is found here. Segel did much better showing us the horrors of breaking up in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. What do they always say: write what you know.
One final note for Nudity Hounds: Cameron Diaz is running around saying “you will see everything”. That is simply not true. But you will see butt. Lots of butt and many well placed arms and objects to hide other parts of their anatomy. Sort of a letdown for a Sex Tape.