The Good

A funny film with a nice bit of extras.

The Bad

I guess I sort of always knew where this movie was going.When Peter (Jason Segal) gets dumped by his movie star girlfriend Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell), he decamps to Hawaii only to find that she is there with her new beau (Russell Brand). In trying to get over his lost love Peter ends up befriending Rachel (Mila Kunis) and it is here that Forgetting Sarah Marshall s its heart. What ensues are a series of comic events that showcase how Peter and Sarah Marshall were doomed, and how sometimes in life we don't get what we want but rather what we need. This film is fraught with just the right amount of Judd Apatow humor (he produced this flick) but it also retains a lot of the heart that has made him the John Hughes of the Twenty-First Century.

While not as great as some efforts by Apatow and Co., Forgetting Sarah Marshall is certainly worth your time.

Features

Deleted and Extended Scenes

This segment of scenes is the kind of thing that an Apatow movie is made for. From what I understand when they make a film there is a script, the actors follow it, and then they basically shoot a bunch of riffs on the scene. All of this is then gone through, cut together, and somehow that's how we get these movies. If you liked this film I would suggest checking out this stuff because it is interesting seeing how certain scenes were left out, while certain scenes that made it in were played differently.

Line-O-Rama

Gag Reel

Again, if you are a fan of this movie you should watch this. Sometimes I wonder if Apatow and his people don't think that they are too funny for their own good. That said, they are pretty funny both on and off screen and this section of the DVD more than showcases that.

Commentary Track

Table Read

I actually saw the shooting of this scene when I covered this movie theatrically for MovieWeb. Here it is simply a straight on shot from a video camera, with Segal singing and playing a keyboard while Kunis, Bell and Jonah Hill sit next to him smiling and enjoying themselves. What I have to give Segal credit for is that he really does go for it here.

Video

Anamorphic Widescreen - 1.85:1. This movie looked good although it is a simple comedy so I am not sure what people are really expecting. There was a simplicity to the images, nothing felt too dirty, but then again I don't think that anything was really supposed to. This release seems like it was compressed well and I didn't notice any areas that were overcooked.

Audio

Dolby Digital 5.1. English, Spanish and French. Subtitled in English, Spanish and French. This movie sounded good but like the picture there isn't anything to write home about. The audio was solid, I didn't have any problems hearing anything, and come to think of it I really didn't need to turn the audio up that loud either.

Package

The four main stars of this movie are showcased on the front cover with the island of Hawaii behind them. The back offers up some promo pictures (as well as pictures from the movie), a small description of what this film is about, a bonus features listing, a cast list and technical specs. Again, this packaging looked good but, like the film, it wasn't anything that really stood out to this writer.

Final Word

I actually had the privilege of covering this film for MovieWeb when it was in its production stage. Actually, I think they were doing reshoots in LA or maybe they were cheating a location for Hawaii. Whatever the case when I covered the movie, I didn't understand why it was given this much press attention. Yes, it was a film that Judd Apatow had something to do with, but that didn't seem to be any call for gathering us journalists together in the wee hours of the morning to talk about this movie. We also got to hear from Kunis and Segal and while that was interesting it wasn't like I felt I had stumbled into some groundbreaking production.

So what does this have to do with the DVD?

Well, I think since I didn't see the movie until it came to this digital format I probably was okay. This movie seemed to do alright theatrically, so people obviously liked it, but I don't think I missed out on anything because I caught it late.