Life as We Know It

(2010)

Directed by

Greg Berlanti

Review by Zach Saltz

Posted - 10/31/10

Life as We Know It employs more clichés that you begin wondering at some point if they're being compensated for overtime work. If royalties were being paid out to the creator of each cliché used in the film, its producers would not be able to afford Josh Duhamel, Katherine Heigl, or Alexis, Brynn, and Brooke Clagett, who share screen time in the role of Baby Sophie. Instead, they would have to cast Rene Auberjonois, Snooki from “Jersey Shore,” and Bayar, the Mongolian infant from Babies.

Going into any movie that uses a poster that's a mix of Look Who's Talking and The Hangover, you know you're in for trouble. If you're looking for originality in a film whose title is so indistinct from another bad film that any time you look it up online, all you come up with is picture of Angelina Jolie in an unconvincing blonde wig, you know you're in for trouble. Any time you see a guy agree to go to a movie with his girlfriend with the understanding that (A) it's their anniversary, and (B) if anyone sees them in the theater, they say they just came from seeing The Social Network, you know you're in trouble. If that guy is me, than you're probably talking about Life as We Know It.

The plot: Successful Biological Clock-Ticking Blonde and Dude (Heigl and Duhamel) are set up by their best friends, a rich, white married couple with a new infant, but they soon realize they can't stand each other. When the rich, white married couple die in a car accident, they leave the orphaned child to the care of the two of them. That's right – Blonde and Dude can live in their big, expensive, rich, white house with the baby, and raise it together. The idea sounds crazy, but every time there's a misunderstanding or crisis narrowly and comically avoided, the characters mutter, “Peter and Allison must have known what they were doing.” Oh yeah? If Peter and Allison were so freaking prescient and clandestine in knowing exactly why Blonde and Dude should be together and how good parents they would be for their baby, why did they get in a car accident in the first place?

You don't need a DSM-IV to diagnose this film as Chick Flick. Are there overwhelming, unnecessary close-ups of infants smiling? Check. Is there at least one scene where the infant throws up on some poor, unknowing parent? Check. Is the baby's doctor a hot, available, rich pediatrician who takes Blonde on a magical date? Check. Is there at least one scene showing that Dude would rather watch children's shows than basketball because becoming a “father” has made him lose his balls? Check. Does the movie star Katherine Heigl? Check.

The supporting characters are equally bland, CBS-sitcom imitations. The neighbors (Fat Macho Man and Hot Wife, Pussy-Whipped Guy and his Fat, Sharp-Tongued Wife with Ten Kids, and Oversexed Gay Men) have no other purpose in this film except to revolve their livelihoods around Blonde and Dude. They literally go outside their houses for the sole purpose saying hi to Blonde and Dude, and make forgettable PG-13-rated insinuations. As mentioned before, Hot Doctor sweeps Blonde off her feet and serves as Dude's chief romantic competitor, while Funny Social Worker checks in on them at the most comedically convenient times (when Blonde is drunk, and later when they make pot brownies). Never mind that one of those times appears to be around 11pm on a weekend.

A few other annoying notes about Life as We Know It. The film takes place in Atlanta, which is not New York, Los Angeles, or San Francisco, meaning it adheres to the law of “Relatively Obscure Big City.” For those of you unfamiliar with this law, it states that any movie that does not take place in one of those aforementioned cities must mention the obscure city it takes place in over and over again to remind audiences where the the movie actually takes place. Blonde runs “the best pastry shop in all of Atlanta,” while Dude works for the Atlanta Hawks, which even the most savvy girl audience may not be familiar with. Do people living in Atlanta even know they have an NBA team? Why couldn't have Dude just worked for the Falcons or the Braves? For a film that takes place in Atlanta, it's remarkable to see so few African-Americans and people with southern accents, but that would constitute nit-picking for a film like this. I'm surprised Ted Turner and Rhett Butler do not have cameo appearances.

There are two funny scenes in the film, and both involve the same throwaway character, Funny Ethnic Friend From Work. When Dude tries to cajole a taxi driver into being the tyke's babysitter during a Big Job Opportunity, Ethnic Friend sees the cab driver storm into the room, infant in arm, and asks, “What service did you get him from?” The other scene comes later in the film, when Dude and Blonde are finally beginning to fall in love (I think the lack of spoiler warning for this sentence can be forgiven), and Ethnic Dude prophetically sums up love: “Marriage is like a prison where everything is the exact same.” This is not a healthy line to include, remembering the potential suicide rate of straight men sitting through all 113 minutes of this.

The film ends in a tepid attempt to recreate the “Frantic Running Through Airport” finale, even though the filmmakers are too stupid to realize this doesn't really work anymore in the post-9/11 era, let alone with a baby in your arm. But love conquers all in the end, and everyone lives happily ever after. It all just goes to show that Peter and Allison must have known what they were doing, setting these people up. They must have known about how cute it would look for Baby Sophie to walk across the room in a diaper, and have Dude follow her in only his white briefs and a beer. They must have known that Dude would give up his high-paying job in Phoenix just to be a happy family, even though he appears to be unemployed by the end of the film, while Blonde is unable expand her business. Oh, Peter and Allison. If only everyone could have such wise friends.

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