For a while in the mid-2000s and early 2010s, Judd Apatow was basically the center of the theatrical comedy universe. After years of writing and producing for film and TV, Apatow stepped behind the camera for the first time in 2005’s The 40-Year-Old Virgin. This movie catapulted Steve Carell into stardom and ushered in a new era of loose, improv-heavy comedies that achieved big box office success.
While Apatow himself directed a relatively small number of these films, a sort of Apatow Extended Universe emerged, with regular players like Seth Rogen, Jason Segel, Paul Rudd, and Jonah Hill headlining their own features, many of which were produced by Apatow. Nowadays, comedies in movie theaters are a dying breed, making Apatow’s films (and those of his collaborators) feel even more like products of their time. Watching The 40-Year-Old Virgin in 2025, 20 years after its premiere, feels like looking into a time capsule in more ways than one.
Why ‘The 40-Year-Old Virgin’ Feels Locked in 2005
In case it’s been a while, The 40-Year-Old Virgin stars Carell as Andy, the titular figure, who works at an electronics store and spends his off time mostly alone playing video games or painting tabletop RPG models. He’s largely given up on the idea of ever losing his virginity and seems comfortable with it. But after a poker game with his coworkers, Cal (Rogen), David (Rudd), and Jay (Romany Malco), where he accidentally spills his secret, the three men become determined to help him do the deed. After some unsuccessful attempts to get it over with, Andy forms a connection with Trish (Catherine Keener) and finds himself torn between taking his friends’ advice and waiting for the right moment with her.
Beyond some of the obvious timely signifiers, such as pop-cultural references and the fact that Andy works at a big-box electronics store, the film feels very much of its time in its humor, as well as its gender and sexual politics. It’s the sort of film that would have likely been described as a “guy movie” at the time, with a decidedly male point of view and characters with some pretty regressive ideas about sex and relationships, not to mention some racial jokes that have very much not aged well.
Now, before anyone decides to call the anti-woke police, much of this is clearly intentional, and Andy’s friends aren’t really meant to be seen as particularly good guys with sound advice. Jay cheats on his girlfriend repeatedly, and David is so hung up on his ex Amy (Mindy Kaling in her film debut) that he’s essentially been stalking her. But it all adds up to a movie that likely wouldn’t have been made at any other point in history, for better or worse.
Beyond the changing social mores, it’s hard to imagine any movie built on so much improvisation could be made today. The movie reportedly used more than a million feet of film stock during the shoot, since Apatow would let the camera keep rolling to capture everyone’s jokes. Besides the fact that most films are shot on digital nowadays, given the challenges and costs of shooting a movie in a post-COVID world, this kind of loose approach to shooting likely isn’t very common anymore.
‘The 40-Year-Old Virgin’ Still Holds Up
Lest I come off like some kind of humorless scold who can’t allow things to exist in the context of their own time, none of the things I’ve mentioned are fatal flaws. The movie ultimately redeems its point of view, as it isn’t until Andy ignores his friends’ terrible advice that he achieves his goal and finds lasting love and happiness in the process. Andy prioritizes making a genuine connection with Trish over getting in her pants, and the movie follows suit. Apatow asked comedy legend Garry Shandling for advice on how to end the film, and Shandling suggested that it needed to be clear that Andy had better sex because he was in love.
Beyond that, much of The 40-Year-Old Virgin is still extremely funny. Carell is terrific at the center, playing Andy as a good-natured guy who always seems out of step with everyone around him, a quality he’s used many times since in a variety of roles. His attempt to tell a bawdy story at the poker game is a masterclass in the sort of comic fumbling that would serve him well as Michael Scott in The Office, which premiered a few months earlier. There’s a distinction between a comedic actor and a comedian who acts, and Carell falls very much in the former camp. Keener also turns in a warm and funny performance as Trish, and supporting players like Jane Lynch, Leslie Mann, Mo Collins, and Cedric Yarbrough all pop in small roles.
The 40-Year-Old Virgin is the kind of movie that would likely never get greenlit today, which makes it even more special. That’s not to say that Hollywood has become too woke or afraid of offending anyone (a common complaint among a certain type of comedy fan), but rather that audience preferences have changed significantly in the intervening two decades. Not every movie has to be utterly timeless to be worth watching years later. Beyond some unavoidable datedness, it remains a very funny film and offers a surprising glimpse into a very different moment in Hollywood history. Stream The 40-Year-Old Virgin on Hulu or Peacock.
- Release Date
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August 11, 2005
- Runtime
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116 minutes
- Producers
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Clayton Townsend