Lent - the annual period of self-denial during which Catholics give up something difficult to live without until Easter - has been going on for 17 days now. Some choose to take the easy route and give up things like meat or carbonated drinks. Others take the more difficult road and relinquish alcohol or, as in the case of the main character of 40 Days and 40 Nights, the one thing that keeps men going from day to day: sex.
Besides the fact that Matt Sullivan (Josh Hartnett) has been dumped by his longtime girlfriend, Nicole (Vinessa Shaw), his life is perfectly OK. He has a good job doing layouts for an Internet company. He has a good-sized apartment with a roommate he gets along with, and, oh yeah, he gets more ass than a toilet seat.
To remedy this and get over his breakup, Matt takes a vow of celibacy for Lent. This means no sex, no kissing and no self-pleasure. Matt occupies himself with work and model-car painting to take his mind off sex. In unexpected serendipity, Matt falls for a girl he meets at the laundromat on day six of his vow.
As the days pass, the pressure on Matt to break his vow grows. The women at work try to seduce him. Some of his other co-workers have started a betting pool on the Internet that grows daily. Even his brother, a priest, doesn't have faith in his capabilities. Matt endures, fighting off twitches, come-ons, and random erections, to keep his vow and finally consummate his relationship with the girl he loves.
Religious comedies like Dogma and Keeping the Faith have been notoriously bad, so we should thank God that 40 Days and 40 Nights only dwells on the subject of religion momentarily. Director Michael Lehmann (Heathers and Airheads), takes a script that, in lesser hands, could easily have been a shoddy B-level sex comedy and turns it into a loosely realistic romantic comedy. Rather than giving us a static character, the audience sees Matt develop and slowly break down over his 40 days. Each moment is enjoyable. If Lehmann can be faulted at all, it would be for his camerawork, which is amateurish at times, but bearable.
40 Days and 40 Nights' premise was not a bad one, and could easily have been turned into a single joke spread out over the course of the entire film - like that of Shallow Hal. Instead, 40 Days and 40 Nights turns out to be a film that doesn't rely on one joke or even retread over gags used in previous "sex comedies." Scenes including a fantastic flight across a terrain of naked, bouncing breasts and strange confessions in a confessional give the movie an original edge.
Even with a good plot and some genuinely funny moments, the film does fall flat on its face when it tries push the comedic envelope past the bounds of reality. For instance, Matt goes to eat at his parents' house one night (to stop thinking about sex), and his father starts explaining to him the different sexual positions a man can perform with an artificial hip. Although a few people might get a cheap chuckle from this, it takes away from the plot's realism.
The backbone of the film is not its comedy, but a set of great performances. The actors inhabit the characters and, unlike many other contemporary young comedies, develop them dynamically. Hartnett, taking a hiatus from war films (Pearl Harbor and Black Hawk Down), seems primed for the role of a leading man in romantic comedies. He displays all the necessary traits: the clumsiness of early Tom Hanks, the cool of John Cusack, and the earnestness of Freddie Prinze Jr.
Shannyn Sossamon, who looks like a hotter, younger version of Helena Bonham Carter, plays Erica, Matt's love interest. Although the script doesn't afford her much screen time, she makes the most of it, stealing every scene she's in.
What really makes the film is its supporting cast. Paulo Costanzo pretty much replays his role from Road Trip, playing Matt's roommate who gives Matt sex tips like a high school football coach giving advice to his players. Matt's co-workers are equally funny, continually putting down bets on when Matt will give in to his urges and constantly trying to persuade him to break his vow.
Although Lent is actually 47 days and 47 nights, beginning Ash Wednesday and ending Easter Sunday, we shouldn't hold this kind of discrepancy against a film as enjoyable as this one. 40 Days and 40 Nights is a thoroughly entertaining romantic comedy that even atheists can enjoy.
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