Meet the Fosters (Steve Carell and Tina Fey), a successful suburban couple comfortably going through the motions, taking care of their two children, and heading out for date night every Friday. Apart from the facts that they're rather busy, and their friends the Sullivans (Mark Ruffalo and Kristen Wiig) are getting a divorce, everything seems tranquil enough if not mundane and uneventful.
Until they decide to steal the Tripplehorn's reservation at a posh restaurant in the centre of a big city one surprising and uncharacteristic night. As it turns out, the Tripplehorn's (James Franco and Mila Kunis) are blackmailing a gangster (Ray Liotta) whose taken pictures of a politician's (William Fichtner) lusty nightlife in order to secure some much needed scratch. The gangster's henchmen, who are also policepersons (Jimmi Simpson and Common), corner the Fosters while they're finishing dinner and demand the return of their boss's philandering flash drive. After a narrow escape, and several spur-of-the-moment relationship related outbursts, it's up to Mark Wahlberg (Holbrooke) and the power of love to unconditionally save the day.
Or night, as it were.
The film's well done and I enjoyed the intelligent ways in which it intermingled the high and low. A lot of its script is concerned with a traditional, stereotypical, steady-as-she-goes marriage, but, if push comes to shove, that traditional couple is still ready to perform a live sex act. The situations in which they find themselves are plausible yet ridiculous, identifiable yet obscure, sordid while remaining wholesome, and fortunate if not predictable. It was still a little to straight and narrow for my tastes; however, since said tastes are so used to not encountering sprightly representatives of the straight and narrow, this straight and narrow film stood on its head.
With Leon (J. B. Smoove) from Curb Your Enthusiasm's sixth and seventh seasons.
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