The Ex (Unrated Widescreen Edition) | 
| Actors: Jason Bateman, Mia Farrow, Charles Grodin, Donal Logue, Amanda Peet
Studio: Weinstein Company
Category: DVD
List Price: $14.95
Buy Used: $1.07
You Save: $13.88 (93%)
New (60) Used (75) from $1.07
Rating:  24 reviews
Sales Rank: 26829
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Widescreen, Ntsc
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: Unrated
Region: 1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 84 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: WEID80116D
UPC: 796019801164
EAN: 0796019801164
ASIN: B000NDJGTK
Theatrical Release Date: 2006
Release Date: August 21, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
| |
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Studio: Genius Products Inc Release Date: 09/30/2008 Rating: Pg13
Amazon.com
When a movie sits on the shelf for a year, the consensus is that it must be a dud. Formerly known as Fast Track, Jesse Peretz's third and most commercial feature may not be a dud, but it comes perilously close. With the success of Garden State, it was inevitable that The Ex would be marketed as a romantic comedy, except it isn't. Sure, there's romance between Tom (Zach Braff) and his pregnant wife, Sofia (Amanda Peet, Igby Goes Down), but this is mostly a black comedy about the ad game, like How To Get Ahead in Advertising. After their baby is born, Sofia puts her legal career on hold to care for little Oliver, but then Tom loses his job as chef (Paul Rudd cameos as his boss), so they move from New York to Ohio where her father, Bob (Charles Grodin in fine fettle), secures Tom a gig as assistant associate creative at his New Age-style ad agency. Their money woes are a thing of the past, but new problems await. The biggest is creative director Chip (Jason Bateman), who briefly dated Sofia in high school. A longtime wheelchair user, Chip resents Tom for stealing his limelight--and for his relationship with Sofia. So, he sets out to turn everyone against his competition (their co-workers include SNL's Fred Armisen and Amy Poehler). Because Chip has such a genial manner, Tom's complaints strike others as unjustified paranoia. By the time he figures out a way to pay Chip back, it's hard to care after all the pratfalls and bits of funny business that fall flat more often than not. There are worse ways to spend 89 minutes, but any random episode of Scrubs or Arrested Development offers more laughs. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 19 more reviews...
 Lifeless and unfunny April 27, 2009
Brian A. Schar (Menlo Park, CA United States)
On paper, this is one of the best movies ever. Jason Bateman? Zack Braff? Amy Poehler? Amanda Peet? Paul Rudd? And Charles Grodin and Mia Farrow for good measure - how can this not be great?
And yet, "The Ex" is not great; it is not even OK, but instead is a lifeless dud. The first scene sets the mood - an awful, clunky bit of exposition that doesn't even rise to the level of bad TV comedy. This is bad news, given that Braff is the star of one of TV's best comedies, and Peet was fantastic in the underrated comedy/drama "Studio 60". It just gets worse from there. I think I was 10 minutes into this before I even chuckled. The cast tries gamely to work with the terrible script and nonexistent direction, generally to no avail. Grodin and Farrow fare the best, perhaps because their years of experience has taught them how to deal with clueless directors.
The lighting and camera work are public-access-TV level bad. I know because I have made movies for public access TV. I had something on the order of a benjamin to work with. I don't know how you get the same look with millions of dollars behind you.
The funniest bits of this movie are in the blooper reel in the special features - where the actors actually get to exercise their talents for comedy without being shackled by horrible writing and nonexistent direction.
As an aside, I didn't buy the crazy moms' group in Columbus, Ohio, until my wife reminded me that her best friend (who happens to live in Columbus) had virtually the same experience as Amanda Peet.
The entire talented cast is completely wasted in this sad misfire. Avoid at all costs.
 I have to disagree with the negative reviews - I liked it November 1, 2008
Filmfan (Denmark)
I join the minority of reviewers who thought this was very funny. I laughed a lot watching it, and thought it was great. It was on TV, so I recorded it - I'll see it again some time. I agree with the reviewer who liked it.
THE EX...CREMENT! 1 3/4 STARS! August 2, 2008
! MR. KNOW IT ALL ;-b (TRI STATE AREA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Well, well, well! It's hard to be positive about this perplexing film. It's not funny enough to be a good comedy, it's not romantic enough to be a good love story and it's not a very good movie period! This film's only saving grace is a good cast. It's a shame, as the movie has some funny moments, but it's negated because it's so irritating! Zach Braff plays a likable guy who has no backbone and that is only the tip of the iceberg. Jason Bateman who is a fine actor plays a particularly unlikable character so well, you just want to ring his neck. I know if I were in the situation Braff was in, I would have taken care of this Jack A$$ after the second day at my new job. As comedies go this one just isn't very enjoyable, but somehow I managed to watch the entire movie mostly because I like the actors involved.
 Could have been much better July 6, 2008
Micheal Hunt (Hellbourne)
The scrubs guy plays a husband who has just had a baby to his wife and lost his job. So he moves back to her parents neighborhood to take a job offer from her old man.
Another guy working at the company is played by Jason Bateman who plays a guy in a wheelchair who hates the scrubs guy for marrying his high school girl. He tries to do everything he can to see Scrubby fails at his job while also trying to break up there marriage so he can move in on her.
Overall, there is a few laughs, but it needed a lot more then what it does have to make it stand out as something other then an average comedy at best.
changing the title hasn't helped December 12, 2007
Roland E. Zwick (Valencia, Ca USA)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
Writers David Guion and Michael Handelman and director Jesse Peretz must have called in a lot of favors when they made "The Ex," for how else to account for the presence of Zach Braff, Amanda Peet, Jason Bateman, Charles Grodin, Mia Farrow, Amy Poehler, Fred Armisen, Paul Rudd and Amy Adams in as slight an indie comedy as the one they have manufactured here? And "manufactured" is definitely the operative term in this case, for "The Ex" feels contrived and phony from the get-go.
After he gets fired from his job as a chef in an upscale Manhattan restaurant, Tom Reilly (Braff) moves with his wife and infant son back to her hometown in Ohio where he gets a job at the same ad agency where his father-in-law (Grodin) works. One of the employees, Chip (Bateman), an old flame of Tom's wife, Sofia (Peet), tries to sabotage Tom at every turn, undercutting him at work and trying to rekindle the romance between Sofia and himself.
"The Ex" fails on a variety of levels, but the primary one is that, while it is supposed to be a satire of small town, middle American values, most of the characters - with their New-Age quirkiness and bohemian eccentricities - seem as if they'd be more at home living in some converted loft in Soho than on a tree-lined street in suburban Ohio. The setting of "The Ex" doesn't feel like Anyplace, USA; in fact, it doesn't feel like anyplace, period, except maybe the fantasy world of two overpaid Hollywood screenwriters. Add to this an assortment of unappealing and unappetizing characters, a tendency towards sitcom-level humor and plotting, and an over-reliance on heavy-handed slapstick and sight gags, and you have one of the major comedy disappointments of 2007. Braff is definitely a talented actor, but "The Ex" is a career path misfire that should be mercifully forgotten.
|
|
|
