Movie review: 'Bridesmaids'

From the first overheated moments of "Bridesmaids," with its Kama Sutra-plus-six-positions sex — so satisfying for him, so exhausting for her — it's clear we're in for that rarest of treats: an R-rated romantic comedy from the Venus point of view.

For the Mars crowd, that means real people in real relationships, real raunchy, real funny. Thank you, Kristen Wiig for every single one of those old-school Rs. In fact, so unusual is this sort of humor in testosterone-driven ha-ha-Hollywood these days, it almost makes me ha-ha-happy that producer Judd Apatow is currently the industry-anointed 800-pound clown prince, since it probably took all 800 pounds of his princely powers to get this film made. (R-rated female-centric, gal-pal entertainments don't exactly top studio wish lists.)


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Wiig stars as Annie, the increasingly unhinged maid of honor for her best friend Lillian's (Maya Rudolph) upcoming up-market wedding. They are surrounded by an ensemble of witty twisted sisters who come in all shapes and sizes (both the wit and the sisters, the unrelated kind, just "doin' it for themselves"), and a director in Paul Feig, who displays a lot of comedic common sense.



This creative collective includes most notably Rose Byrne ("Damages") and Melissa McCarthy ("Mike & Molly"), with Wendi McLendon-Covey ("Reno 911!") and Ellie Kemper ("The Office") as the other merry maids. They all work hard to wring the most nonsense out of the clever script cowritten by Wiig and Annie Mumolo, friends whose collaboration tracks back to their Groundlings improv days. (See Wiig's Annie and Mumolo's nervous fellow passenger doing a high-anxiety, fear-of-flying scene slam at 30,000 feet midway through the movie.)

Wiig, now in her sixth year at "Saturday Night Live," was already on her way to becoming the new grande dame of comedy with a zillion weird characters (like the simpering singer with creepy tiny wooden hands and severely receding hairline). She has a fearless way of offering up her body for slapstick sacrifice that can make you forget just how fine-boned pretty she can be. In "Bridesmaids," she proves she's a gifted actress as well, giving a surprising depth and affecting vulnerability to Annie amid her collapsing world.