Kelly Clarkson!

Although I appreciated Steve Carell's run on The Daily Show and the mediocre Yank version of The Office, I really didn't have any interest in seeing The 40 Year Old Virgin. The preview made it seem boring and sophmoric (in the bad way), and I've never really dug slapstick that much. I know that sounds totally elitist, but I'm not trying to be -- I love a good fart joke as much as anyone else. I just don't necessarily want to settle in for 105 minutes of fart jokes (or, in this case, juvenile sex jokes).

My bad. The 40 Year Old Virgin is pretty damned funny and -- shocker of shockers! -- mostly inoffensive. Like most good lowbrow comedies, it's an ensemble piece with all the necessary archetypes: "the buddies," "the boss," "the lover," "the neighbour," etc. The casting is excellent (Catherine Keener is a particularly inspired choice) and the jokes rarely stray too far below medicore.

(Plus, it's educational: remember that episode of Family Guy, when Peter loses his job and tries out a bunch of alternate occupations? Remember the scene when he's moonlighting as a streetwalker and propositions Lois? Remember how he leans through the car window and offers her a "Cleveland steamer"? Yeah... I didn't get the reference either. But now, thanks to Gerry Bednob's hilarious monologue, I do. I also know what a rusty trombone, dirty sanchez and Cincinatti bowtie are, Bob help me.)

All in all, C. and I both dug it way more than we expected and it may have introduced a new conceit to language: the use of celebrity names as epithet.