Date Night (2010)

Given their intelligence and comedic skills, I had a reasonable expectation that Steve Carell and Tina Fey would deliver the funny in Date Night (despite a smattering of snippets and prerelease publicity that I could only term as blase). So I was pleasantly vindicated after finally catching their film on DVD (obtained from a competitor that gets popular movies one month before this rental service). Some seem to complain that Date Night's comedy and action are less than full-bore -- and if it is the brassy, blast-laden half of The Other Guys that they seek (which is actually a spoof of over-the-top cop action films), they would be right. What Steve and Tina deliver instead is the nuanced, whimsy-laden half of The Other Guys (there so aptly team-played by Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg). Indeed, Date Night's third star, Wahlberg again, plays a mild-mannered guy who is as inscrutably whimsical as he remains shirtless. Even so, Steve and Tina remain the focus, and they ably carry the movie -- even the outtakes that run throughout the closing credits show their improvisational genius -- so long as viewers can appreciate understated, script- and character-driven humor such as in The Office. Date Night resonates with comedy favorites like True Lies, where a boring suburbanite couple tries to break out of their rut for just one night and gets a helluva lot more than they bargained for. (I'm never a fan of scenes set in strip clubs but both movies serve up a crisp clueless-couple salad with light raunch dressing on the side.) Date Night is not family-viewing fare unless your kids are a mature 13 or older -- but all sexual references are innocuous and "keep it uptown." Best of all to my mind, Date Night shows the chemistry of a married couple that knows each other and is committed to each other -- no matter what may befall them during the Date from Hell. 4 stars.