Jason Segel and Ed Helms
“JEFF WHO LIVES AT HOME” My rating: B+ (Opens wide on March 16)
83 minutes | MPAA rating: R
Jeff (Jason Segel) is a thirtysomething slacker who lives in his mom’s basement and obsesses over the M. Night Shyamalan movie “Signs.”
You know…that’s the one where Mel Gibson’s family is besieged in their farmhouse by space aliens? And they discover that little, inconsequential things they almost overlooked were in fact cosmic signs of how to beat the invasion?
Jeff acknowledges that “Signs” can seem meandering and unfocused, but now that he’s watched it a couple dozen times he finds tremendous comfort knowing that in the end it comes together in “one perfect moment.”
Jeff’s opening monologue in “Jeff Who Lives at Home” seems a mere toss-off, the idiotic ramblings of a navel-gazing stoner who hasn’t had a girlfriend since high school.
But remember Jeff’s words. They’ll come back to us in yet another perfect moment.
“Jeff Who Lives at Home” is a pleasantly meandering effort from the writing/directing Duplass Brothers. It’s funny and goofy.
It also exhibits more genuine soul than any comedy since…well, since Bill Forsythe’s sublime “Local Hero” back in 1983.
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