Poetic License

Doubtless, this is a film about a woman trying to more deeply understand herself, played delicately and beautifully and hilariously by Leslie Mann, and directed brilliantly, compassionately, and unselfconsciously by her daughter Maude Apatow - and you will laugh a lot, Toronto had a field day with this one - but I have very little to say beyond that. The film goes where it goes, explores in a limited scope what it explores (the above). I hate to say it, for such a well-made film about a woman, but to me, the most interesting and complicated character, and performance, was one of the guys this time.

I have long since held the belief that heartthrobs, though handsome, do not make themselves through good looks - although, that element is vital. A heartthrob must be handsome or the whole enterprise falls apart. It is, however, in the eyes. Without the eyes - the unrelenting vulnerability and frisson of madness that can be gleaned there, no viewer can truly know, and therefore love, the archetypal heartthrob.

Cooper Hoffman is a heartthrob now, it's happened, he's graduated, it's happening, get used to it - we're in for another age of Hoffman domination, we all know this, we cannot escape our destiny.

Poetic License is less a Rom-com and more a Com, and yet somehow Hoffman's Ari complicates things. Something very dark and very sad - something annoyingly familiar to those of us who recognise it - is happening with Ari, and to a lesser extent, his friend Sam. Maybe some will dismiss the entire film as a discontent-fuelled "episode" for both boys, but it's hard to go there and brush it off (though I really did laugh, a lot, I promise), when the central conceit of both boys' frustrations and anguish is not so far off from the genuine anguish so many of my generation are having a hard time reconciling.

Oh, Umnia, taking movies too seriously again, oh my god, who could have seen this coming?

Ari specifically was hard to let go - Hoffman's tuned and singing version of this boy off his Lexapro was...I couldn't let it go, I can't let it go, it's been three hours and I can't let it go. I know I'm supposed to laugh and let it go but someone needs to check in on Ari. I'm overdoing it, I know, but I can't let it go.

Therefore, that performance - that access Hoffman could provide into Ari, it's the mark of the beast, of the legend - we already knew but I'm still so on board, like, what did- how did he just do that? How did he know my friends so well? How did he manage to access them like that?

I want to see this guy in everything, and I'm assuming I'm about to – I want to see him in the great roles of the industry for decades to come. Let's do this, 1000 years Cooper Hoffman.

And, on that note, 1000 years Maude Apatow too - she really nailed that. It was part Allen part Apatow (Judd), wholly new and wholly hilarious. Her point of view is very considered - I loved it. I hope she keeps directing all sorts - but especially comedies.