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List Price: $14.95 | | Label: Weinstein Company
Salesrank: 18696
Released: August 21, 2007 |
| Our Price: $2.19 |
| Used Price: $1.03 |
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MPAA Rating: Unrated
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Tom (Braff) and Sofia (Peet) have just had their first baby and that means it is time for Tom to grow up. But, when Tom goes to work for his father-in-law, his new boss Chip (Bateman) seems to have it out for him. Tom soon discovers that Chip is still carrying a flame for Sophia from their high school days. Now, Chip will stop at nothing to see Tom out of the company and out of Sophia’s life. As the two go head to head, Tom must expose Chip’s dirty tricks and push him out of the picture forever.
Description of The Ex (Unrated Widescreen Edition):
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
The Ex (Unrated Widescreen Edition) Reviews:
I have to disagree with the negative reviews - I liked it 
2008-11-01 - 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! 
2008-08-02 - 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 
2008-07-06 - 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
2007-12-12 - 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.
Natural Disaster
2007-12-12 - Director Jesse Peretz used to play bass in the 80s for the band the Lemonheads. He directed a music video "Big Me" for the Foo Fighters. His other features are "First Love, Last Rites" & "The Chateau." This has to be one of the least funny DVDs I've seen. Amanda Peet is apparently in love with her husband, although she sends out no emotional signals other than her dialogue. Zach Braff is famous for "Scrubs" TV series, "Garden State" & "The Last Kiss." As Tom in this movie, he's about the least intelligent person on the planet. When he tries to get Wesley's help and assaults him, no one but a child abuser could continue to root for his character. Jason Bateman who was in "The Break Up" and "Mr. Margorium's Wonder Emporium," is also one of the worst villains by trying to score points by faking paraplegia, apparently successfully according to the plot. Charles Grodin looks so much like Amanda Peet that she must have been adopted. Mia Farrow doesn't do much in this film, but is more interesting that most. Wesley, the neighborhood boy who can down a burger in a bite, is played by newcomer Lucien Maisel. Paul Rudd and Amy Adams have small parts that must have made them wonder why they agreed to appear in this film. The humor misses its mark, coming across as witless and frequently mean-spirited. "The Ex" is a disaster without a natural disaster. Taxi!
