THE BIG SICK -- My review

Thank you, Kumail Nanjiani and Emily Gordon! Thank you for proving that romcoms can be funny, touching, and timely. Thank you for showing that romcoms don’t have to be Nancy Meyer studio formula clichés or idiotic raunchfests. And thank you, Michael Showalter for emphasizing the truth and reality of the situation in your direction and letting the comedy rise organically.

THE BIG SICK also may be the first romantic comedy I’ve ever seen where the young couple never actually says “I love you.”  But you know for sure that they do. 

If I have one complaint, and the same I have with every movie Judd Apatow is involved with – it’s too fucking long. You could so easily cut twenty minutes out of this film and lose nothing. The audience is so far ahead of you on numerous occasions. I just never understand the resistance to cutting when you can take a lovely B+ movie and turn it into a home run A with a few more judicious trims. And don’t say every moment is needed. Like I said, I could cut twenty minutes with absolute ease.   There's an old saying in the theater (that's true): Cut twenty minutes and run two years longer.

Still, the movie is filled with charm. Kumail Nanjiani and Zoe Kazan have that intangible ingredient that makes romcoms work – chemistry. You so love them together. You so want them to be together. You’re so thankful it’s not Amy Schumer trying to go legit.

The story stems from the real life incident that happened to Kumail and his real life wife (and co-writer), Emily Gordon. She was put in a medically induced coma.   So I guess that section of script Kumail wrote by himself.  Note to Emily:  there are easier ways to come up with movie premises. 

The film wonderfully depicts the culture clash between Kumail’s Pakistani family and customs and Emily’s North Carolina background. Both of the couples’ parents almost steal the movie. Ray Romano and Holly Hunter are fantastic. And Anupam Kher and Zenobia Shroff match them scene for scene.

Bottom line: It’s just a pleasure to see a movie about real people having genuine emotions, where the comedy comes out of character and is funny and the heartfelt moments are earned. Go see THE BIG SICK. It does for romcoms what Wonder Woman did for the Allied Powers in World War I.