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THE VOW Channing Tatum's best shot at being taken even semiseriously as an actor would be to only make movies with Rachel McAdams for the rest of his life. A fine performer with a vulnerable and disarming beauty, McAdams has previously been romantically linked on screen to Ryan Gosling, James Marsden and Owen Wilson (among others), but it's no major feat to generate chemistry with talented guys like these. But to strike cinematic sparks with a limited stud like Tatum not only requires skill on McAdams' part, it also demands that her co-star somewhat rise to her level. And when The Vow works, it's almost always because of the give-and-take dynamics between the pair. Based on a true story, this centers on Paige and Leo, a madly-in-love married couple whose lives change drastically after Paige loses much of her memory in a car accident. She can remember her life before Leo — her wealthy, right-wing parents (Jessica Lange and Sam Neill), her circle of sorority-sister friends, her slick fiancé (Scott Speedman), her interest in attending law school — but she can't remember anything afterward. That would encompass her career in sculpture, her liberal world view, her switch from carnivore to vegetarian, and, oh yeah, the fact that she has a husband. Thus, it's up to Leo to insure that they get reacquainted, but Claire's having a hard time falling in love with him this time around, as the comfort and security of her life at home are more reassuring to her than sharing an apartment with this perfect stranger. Although McAdams gives the more fully rounded performance, it's Tatum's character who earns the majority of our sympathies, and the actor does just enough right to guarantee our allegiance to his cause. The scenes in which he tries to connect with his equally frustrated wife are the best in the film, and once the story moves past this and settles on Paige's betrayals by those from her past, it gets bogged down in mopey melodrama and never recovers. Still, for those seeking out a love story that doesn't insult the head or the heart through shameless manipulation, the sweetly sincere The Vow mostly fulfills its promise. **1/2
WANDERLUST As scattershot and unfocused as its characters, Wanderlust casts Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston as George and Linda, a Manhattan couple who have just purchased their first home (a "micro-loft," no bigger than one of Donald Trump's closets). But when George loses his job thanks to his boss' illegal activities and Linda has her documentary about penguins with testicular cancer rejected by HBO, the pair find themselves broke and homeless. While traveling to Atlanta to stay with George's vulgar, wealthy brother and his spacy wife (Ken Marino, the film's co-scripter, and Michaela Watkins are quite funny in these roles), they chance upon Elysium, a blissful commune where the residents live off the land, share everything (including partners) and smoke lots of pot. As they become acquainted with (among others) the philosophical Seth (Justin Theroux), the cheerful Eva (Malin Ackerman), the nudist winemaker Wayne (Joe Lo Truglio) and commune founding father Carvin (Alan Alda), each spouse weighs the pros and cons of permanently staying at this so-called "intentional community." Writer-director David Wain's film sports an intriguing premise, but the end result never really commits to any particular viewpoint (is Wain laughing with the commune residents or at the commune residents?), a wishy-washy approach that doesn't allow for any insights into the existence of such a beatific place in our capitalist society. This wouldn't matter if the movie fulfilled its obligations as a comedy, but genuine laughs are spread rather thinly throughout, with some bizarre and inspired bits taking a back seat to the usual raunchy gags — this includes an agonizing scene in which a nervous George, about to have sex with Eva, ad-libs various vulgar come-ons in front of the mirror. This endless improv sequence is the type that's usually found as an extra feature on the DVD for a Judd Apatow film (oh, did I mention he's one of this movie's producers?), meaning the home-entertainment branch will have to find something else to fill its slot on the disc. Given the abundance of comparable material — from Rudd sitting on a toilet to Lo Truglio and his prosthetic penis (he's no Michael Fassbender) bouncing through the woods — I don't think they'll need to put in any overtime. **
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