"How to conceive a good idea... and a new life"

Title: Maybe Baby
Year: 2000
Genre: Comedy, Romance
Director: Ben Elton, Hugh Laurie (some scenes, uncredited)
Writer: Ben Elton (based on his novel "inconceivable"), Ben Elton (written by)
Runtime: 104min

Cast: Hugh Laurie, Joely Richardson, Adrian Lester, Tom Hollander, Matthew Macfadyen, James Purefoy, Rowan Atkinson

Produc: Pandora Cinema, BBC Films

In Maybe Baby, Lucy (Joely Richardson) and Sam (Hugh Laurie) are a young couple who seeks, by all means, existing or yet to be, to have a baby.

Lucy is going through that moment, in which becoming a mother has become absolutely essential, to happily continue with her life in London, and Sam also welcomes the idea of ​​fatherhood. Still, none of this takes away that it is her who actually dies to be a mother. Because what Sam wants, more than anything, is for Lucy to be happy, and if a baby is what it takes, then, it is welcome.

Sadly, to try to get pregnant, and that for a woman, that this in fact, actually happens, are two entirely different things. It does not take much to Lucy and Sam to understand that this may be more complicated and stressful than what they had thought. Such, ends up being the effort for that some damn sperm decides to cooperate, that what should have been the pleasure of having sex, ends up being the constant, tiresome routine, to see if they happen to be lucky.

This is the concept that Ben Elton works so skillfully, in a screenplay that is full of good jokes, which, although of high tone, never fail to stay stylish, though obviously, aimed towards a mature audience.

Already, the film begins with Sam at the BBC, where he is an editor. There, he and George (Adrian Lester), his friend and colleague, attend a meeting, which is leading the idiot of Nigel (Matthew Macfadyen), head of both. They listen to their superior from the last row, where they can speak more quietly, without being heard. Suddenly, Sam cell phone rings, he apologizes for the noise and answers it. This is his wife, who it seems, has everything under control, and now is when, according to her calendar, she is needing of his bit. Here is just great, how Sam must escape from the meeting, to put on a helmet, ride his bike, and go running to the bed. Something we will see happening several times.

But the film is far from staying in just this.

Lucy goes to a gynecologist, Mr. James, played by the remarkable Rowan Atkinson, and who makes her go through a lot of fertility tests, from which Sam does not get rid of. All this happens just when Sam had recently met with the stupid and eccentric Ewan Proclaimer (Tom Hollander), a film director whose idea of ​​a good script was of wild sex and drugs, and Sam would soon discard. Then, angry and eager to humiliate him, Nigel transfers him to the children's programming. And now, when Sam thinks he has reached the lowest that he could afford, he decides it is time to fulfill his dream of writing.

Unfortunately, the big idea that has emerged to him is to write about their own, more intimate relationship issues: their seeking for a child. To Sam will not cost practically nothing, to construct the most successful of the comedies, and with the most original jokes ever. The only thing wrong here is that Lucy, who disagrees with the idea, had already taken his word that he would never adapt their own lives.

Maybe Baby is a very funny comedy that brings humor to something that in reality would not be funny at all. It also, cleverly caricatures the world of movies, and that whole business of how films are conceived. Were producing good art is only one part, in a whole big chain.

My rating: 7/10

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