I was lucky enough to attend a screening of the film Sex After Kids screened at the Royal House Theater on January 11th along with the film's director, producer, many of the cast and crew, and a room full of contributors and fans. To be fair it was a film friendly audience, but amongst the crowd were a few who went in with no investment in the movie at all and from them I found they had the same reaction as did the fans: it was hilarious.
The movie would be categorized as a comedy. But what does that really mean? According to Wikipedia, (the source of all knowledge, right?), a comedy is, "to amuse and elicit laughter from the audience." Check, check, and check. Then it goes on to list a series of types and Sex After Kids doesn't exactly fit any of them. It's a bit of a romantic comedy, but also fits some of the criteria to be considered a "black comedy" except, quite frankly, it's too sweet and earnest for the way it tackles the 'taboo' subjects to fit into that category completely.
It's a similar to ensemble comedies such as Home for the Holidays, Beautiful Girls, and Something's Gotta Give but the cast is loosely affiliated yet connected like in such movies as Love, Actually or New Year's Eve. So I'd like to propose a new category. Since it's an assembled ensemble comedy I suggest: Assenembled comedy. You heard it here first.
Sex After Kids gathers a fantastic cast of six degree separated parents as they deal with relations after having kids. In some cases the issues that are raised are 20 years after the birth of their kids. It's like a coming of age story for adults about a time in life no one ever seems to talk about. There are so many (too many?) movies about twenty-something brats transitioning from college life into being an actual adult. But what about everyone who has done that, since life doesn't stop once you give up keg parties, settle down, and have a family?
I thought the movie was funny, honest, even if some of the situations were "exaggerated for comedic effect" (thanks Wikipedia!) and ultimately sweet. Amanda Brugel is my new hero. Zoie Palmer and Paul Roger Amos made me cry. And Kris Holden-Ried did that thing where at one point he says a line but turns that line into a whole story. Also, it looked beautiful, the locations felt authentic to each character and not overly staged. And I felt like although the movie wasn't detail heavy into each character that we got a full sense of who everyone was as people.
I wish I could sum up the movie easily, but it's actually the type of movie that after you see it for days later you and your friends will be talking about various scenes and laughing again as you go through the funniest bits you can recall to the ones you suddenly remember again.
