‘I Love You, Man’ is maybe a little too accurate for comfort

FROM JASON’S LOCAL THEATER — The way my wife kept knowingly elbowing me in the ribs the entire 110 minutes of I Love You, Man was more than just physically uncomfortable.

Since graduating from college several years ago, I’ve found myself mired in those particularly strange doldrums where man-friends are awkward to come by. It’s not that I’m socially inept. It’s just that the workforce is a different playground than high school or college — relationships are much more casual and often competitive now that I’m almost 30.

So in the theater with Lisa, I was squirming a bit about the film’s main theme: When all-around good guy Peter Klaven (Paul Rudd) is engaged and needs to find  a best man, he realizes his old friends have fallen by the wayside and goes in search of a new blood brother.

Lisa’s been hassling me now about this for ages. “Why don’t you have any close guy friends?” she asks. “Don’t you want to go get a beer with someone?”

The problem is that at my age, how do you 1) find a guy with common interests, 2) build a relationship without feeling totally, totally gay, and 3) find time to juggle a bro and a wife?

1. This step was easy in college. There were so many dudes packed into such confined dorm space that you couldn’t help but find somebody interesting doing something awesome, and the social barriers to entry were lowered. These days, I’d almost have to join some sort of club to meet other guys with my humor, cultural knowledge set, and sensibilities.Church is right out of the question; I don’t do sports because I’m uncoordinated; I refuse to hang out at a game shop; and I refuse to join activist groups because they always sour. A favorite hang-out is the library, but that’s no place to strike up a conversation.
2. Anyone familiar with the Man Code knows it’s easy to strike up relationships with women. It’s finding common ground with other guys that’s the delicate matter.First, there is my northeastern US puritanical unbringing and its “manhood” baggage. Men don’t share feelings. They don’t talk things out. They don’t hug or touch in any way other than the occassional spirited punch in the arm or Top Gun-style high five.
3. If you’re married, you know that time is a precious gift from the gods. Chances are you already have at least one job, a house to clean, cars to repair, dogs to walk, kids to clean up after, a toilet to fix, the lawn to mow, a kitchen to remodel, a sidewalk to shovel, groceries to buy, and then if there is time left over you collapse and maybe think about sex.After that, whatever hour a day is left over can be divided amongst television, video games, or beer.The Internet is a novel solution to the time-crunch-vs.-friends problem. For instance, Andrew and I have been hanging out online, watching movies, bragging about sexual prowess, debating economic and political realities, arguing about which bands are good and which are shite. Watching Battlestar Galactica. Surprisingly, watching Andrew make his own cheese. Gaming.

Paul Rudd decided to take an unrealistic tack. He trying man-dating. He actively went out seeking a friend, and that hilariously backfired until by chance he stumbled onto a kindred soul in Jason Segel (of How I Met Your Mother), who is the least interesting part of the entire film.

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Let it be said at this point that I refuse to use or endorse the term “bro-mance.”

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Overall, I was pretty happy with the film, with its sympathetic portrayal of my plight, positive treatment of gay characters, the excellent and appropriate use of Andy Samberg and J.K. Simmons as members of Rudd’s family, and the cute Rashida Jones as Rudd’s fiance (The Office), who thankfully plays against the ball-and-chain stereotype.

I was pleasantly surprised, really, with how well the script played out. I was wary of the suspiciously positive treatment Entertainment Weekly gave the film — the rare A for a comedy — and how various media have been overtly positioning Paul Rudd as the new everyman star.

That’s not to say there were no weaknesses in the flick: The constantly overplayed “guy slang” was annoying as hell, as was the blatant product placement and overbearing Rush worship.

Now, Judd Apatow wasn’t involved as far as I could tell, but the major players were from his crew and were making good use of his comedic style, falling in line with the likes of The 40-Year-Old Virgin. That means I Love You, Man was replete with the fart and sex humor I typically despise, but mostly with such heart that it avoided the shallowness of many of buddy films.

That could be attributed mainly to a dialogue that isn’t necessarily realistic so much as it is true, which I know is a fine distinction to make. But for all Rudd’s fumbling and polite clumsiness, he felt like a guy I could understand — a John Cusack more than a John Wayne.

Read This: The Godfather (and fantasy cast)

FROM JASON’S LACK OF OMERTA — I’m not Italian. I have no pretenses that the mob is a modern Robin Hood. Yet my three favorite movies of all time, in order, are Goodfellas, The Godfather, and Casino.

For some reason, I’m a complete sucker for the gloss-on-dross lessons of sexy Sicilian gangland flicks.

About four years ago, I finally forced myself to read Mario Puzo’s 1969 novel, which was adapted to the big screen in 1972. I’d been putting off reading it since I picked it up — mostly for the respectable black hardcover — for 25 cents at a library book sale some years before.

It took about six pages to become totally engrossed, and I literally didn’t put the book down for two days straight. I read it while cooking. I read it in the bathroom. I read it at work. I tried to read it while driving, but that didn’t work out too well.

If you’ve never seen the movie (sinner), then we can’t be friends. But here’s a brief summary: New York Mafia boss Vito Corleone is gunned down by a rival Sicilian family because he refused to fund a venture into the narcotics trade. His eldest son, Santino, wants to take revenge. His middle son, Fredo, is too deep in shock to do anything. His youngest son, Michael, wants nothing to do with Vito’s criminal lifestyle.

But Michael is the one who ultimately takes vengeance against his father’s attacker, and he is forced to flee to Italy to seek refuge from the law. When he returns years later, Michael feels he has no choice but to assume his father’s role at the head of the family. His naivety is stripped away and he becomes his father’s more ruthless, vigilant incarnation.

It’s an amazing story, and I tried to sidestep a whole mess of spoilers about who lives, who dies, who betrays The Family, and how Michael comes to grips with his destiny. In some ways, The Godfather is almost a western, showing how some men utterly scoff at the idea of rule by any law other than power.

I only have one problem: I’ve read this book three times now, mostly using the huge stars of the Francis Ford Coppola movie as the characters in my imagination. This last time I read through, though, I’ve found myself supplanting Al Pacino, James Caan, Marlon Brando, Robert Duvall, and the rest of the Coppola cast for more recent actors.

I feel dirty. But flow with me here and I’ll try to explain who I would envision in a modern recasting of the film:

• Vito Corleone
  1972: Marlon Brando
  2008: Alfred Molina
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  Nobody will ever have Brando’s nasal Italian drone, understated power, or screen presence. But Molina has the capacity to be evil and sympathetic, which when reduced to its core components is what The Godfather is all about. He’s about the right age and physique to play the wizened head of the family, and he has a commanding demeanor about him, even when playing ridiculous roles like Doctor Octopus.
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• Michael Corleone
  1972: Al Pacino
  2008: Mark Ruffalo
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  He’s done some dreadful romantic comedies (13 Going on 30, anyone?), but with a beard and some crow’s feet, Ruffalo could pull off Michael’s reluctant gravitas. He’s proven he’s more than a handsome face with his roles in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Zodiac, and I think he has the capacity for someone cold and brutal as Michael must become.
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• Santino Corleone
  1972: James Caan
  2008: Brad Garrett
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  Roll with me here. Garrett’s sitcom acting is genuinely bad. But the man is towering, and I think he could be apishly scary as hell with a .45 strapped under his arm and a deathly oath of vengeance against a rival family. Imagine him bearing down on you with a scowl. Give the man a chance to show he’s something other than a hack comedian and I guarantee he’ll scare the crap out of you as a true-blood Sicilian.
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• Fredo Corleone
  1972: John Cazale
  2008: Giovanni Ribisi
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  Ribisi is always good, even when he’s in bad films (The Mod Squad). He’s edgy enough to be a mobster but boyish enough to be shocked into incompetence when Sollozo has Vito shot. Fredo is taken out of the picture pretty early in The Godfather, but comes back in The Godfather II as a cretinous boot-licker to a Las Vegas hotelier. Craven is something I think Ribisi could pull off well.
  .
• Tom Hagen
  1972: Robert Duvall
  2008: Gabriel Byrne
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  The adopted Irish son of Vito Corleone, Hagen is the Don’s consiglieri, his chief adviser. He’s also The Family’s chief legal muscle. Byrne (whom I remember best for The Usual Suspects) might be a little too old to play a contemporary to Vito’s blood sons, like he is in the original, but he has the right intelligence in his eyes and slick bravado for the roll, I think.
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• Luca Brasi
  1972: Lenny Montana
  2008: Stanley Tucci
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  He’s nowhere old or muscularly bloated as his 1972 counterpart, but I think Tucci has the capacity to be one scary mofo. Brasi is Vito’s loyal assassin, a one-man army working in the shadows and striking enough fear into rival families to keep them in line. Tucci, when he’s not playing a gay guy (The Devil Wears Prada), can be hard. Think his bad-guy-cop in Lucky Number Slevin but silent and apathetic about death.
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• Virgil Sollozzo
  1972: Al Lettieri
  2008: Armand Assante
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  He’s already been in Gotti and Hoffa, so if you can forget Judge Dredd, then we have a ringer. Assante can come off as indifferently dangerous, cool on the outside but ready to erupt and spew violence at any moment. He also has a somewhat exotic look that could work given Sollozzo’s nickname of “The Turk.”

Rounding out the supporting cast, I would probably give the role of Michael’s all-American wife, Kay Adams, to Jennifer Connelly. She’s just pin-up-girl-pretty enough and has a bit of 1940s glamor without being outright gorgeous.

The part of Hollywood producer Jack Woltz — the one who wakes up with a horse’s head in his bed in the famous scene — would go to J.K. Simmons. That’s right, good ol’ J. Jonah Jamison. He’s just brusque jerk enough.

Carlo Rizzi, the angry wife-beater who marries Michael’s sister, would go to Vincent D’Onofrio. He has just the right mix of crazy and wrathful to really make you hate him. And we could give the role of Corleone mercenary boss Clemenza to Dennis Farina and toadie Paulie Gatto to Joe Pantaliano.

Well, there. I hope that list pissed off a great many film and book buffs. Feel free to post your own ideas.