50/50

50/50

50/50 was made so well, and executed with such earnest emotion and intent, that I’d reckon the odds of this happening are slim to none. The film’s basic snobbery reads like something lifted wholesale from some saccharine made-for-TV-movie. 50/5o never for a moment risks unraveling into the sort of melodramatic and painfully sentimentalist narrative best reserved for the Hallmark channel.

50/50 follows Adam (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), an old-fashioned and somewhat uptight twenty-something living in Seattle whose doctor diagnoses him with a rare form of spinal cancer (which he protests; according to Adam, he doesn’t smoke or drink, and he also recycles). Shouldering the burden of his circumstances, he turns to his friend Kyle (Rogen), his girlfriend Rachel (Bryce Dallas Howard), and his mother Diane (Anjelica Huston) for support, and seeks help from a thoroughly green therapist (Anna Kendrick); as he begins treatment, 50/50 reveals itself to be less concerned with being plot-driven and focuses almost strictly on Adam’s development as a person.

 50/50 is the story of a guy's transformative and, yes, sometimes funny journey to health. 50/50 draws its emotional core from Will Reiser's own experience with cancer and reminds us that friendship and love, no matter what bizarre turns they take, are the greatest healers.

50/50 is one of the funniest movies you may see in a theater this year, so long as you’re receptive to the blunt, crude, and unapologetic humor so central to the stylings of Goldberg and Rogen (who both produced the movie along with screenwriter Will Reiser.

50/50 never shies away from being vulgar (don’t ask Kyle what he really uses that razor for) but  there’s something refreshingly upfront about many of the film’s punchlines– whether they’re aimed at Adam’s cancer, his relationships, or anything else– and its general attitude as well. This is thoroughly human material; nothing here is sugarcoated or watered down, from the jokes to the raw emotional beats.

By personal experiences, 50/50 is an original story about friendship, love, survival and finding humor in unlikely places.