There are few surprises in Sex Tape, and even comedy pros Cameron Diaz and Jason Segel can’t drag this disappointingly SFW film above mildly bland amusement.
The plot – what there is of it – revolves around Annie (Diaz) and Jay (Segel) trying to inject some spice into their ten-year, two-kid marriage. The obvious solution, apparently, is to make a sex tape. Three hours and every position in The Joy Of Sex later, the passion is back in the marriage and the video is up in the Cloud, where it syncs with all the devices Jay has inexplicably given as gifts to his friends, family and mailman.
Cue a series of vaguely nonsensical events as Annie and Jay trying increasingly unlikely methods of deleting all the copies of the video, while being blackmailed by someone who’s already found it.
The low point is a convoluted scene in Annie’s potential employer’s house that relies entirely on toilet humour and slapstick for its comedy – they use the word ‘diarrhoea’, Jay ineptly flees a dog and falls out a window, and Annie takes cocaine. All that’s missing is someone slipping on a banana peel.
In its defence, the film pokes fun at the ridiculous premise of trying to physically erase copies of the video when a child asks Jay why he didn’t just remote delete it from the Cloud. There’s also a fun cameo from Jack Black as a porn king who offers some surprisingly sage relationship advice.
Overall, however, Sex Tape doesn’t do much aside from reiterate the point that only professionals should film themselves having sex.
2/5 stars
Sex Tape is in cinemas now.
