The 40-Year-Old VirginMovie Reviews

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Avg. Critic Score: 73 out of 100 Generally favorable reviews Metascore® based on all critic reviews
Information for Parents:
16 Iffy for 16+
Read Common Sense Media review

Critic scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating more favorable reviews.

  • 91
    Entertainment Weekly | Owen Gleiberman

    Buoyantly clever and amusing. Read full review

  • 88
    New York Daily News | Jack Mathews

    Works on every level. The humor and language are as crude as an R rating allows, but Carell and Apatow's script is so hip, funny and - yes - innocent that it's never offensive. Read full review

  • 88
    Chicago Sun-Times | Roger Ebert

    Surprisingly insightful, as buddy comedies go, and it has a good heart and a lovable hero. Read full review

  • 75
    Rolling Stone | Peter Travers

    Steve Carell, best known as a team player on "The Daily Show," "The Office" and such movies as "Anchorman," earns top-banana status as Andy. He is flat-out hilarious. Read full review

  • 75
    San Francisco Chronicle | Peter Hartlaub

    A love story that gets the single male culture down so honestly and unapologetically that it can't help but push the boundaries of political correctness. Read full review

  • 75
    Philadelphia Inquirer | Carrie Rickey

    Apatow's film succeeds in having its virginity and losing it, too. Like "Wedding Crashers," it purges its cynicism with romanticism. Read full review

  • 75
    USA Today | Claudia Puig

    Carell accomplishes the task of being sweet-natured without becoming cloying. Read full review

  • 75
    Boston Globe | Wesley Morris

    A lot of the credit for what's right with 'The 40-Year-Old Virgin goes to the screenplay, which Carell and Apatow wrote. They like these characters and, when it matters, they dare to give them feelings, none truer than Andy's. Read full review

  • 70
    Wall Street Journal |

    The jokes fly fast and sometimes very funny. They are, more often, crude and homophobic. Still, a genuine sweetness lurks. Read full review

  • 50
    The Hollywood Reporter | Kirk Honeycutt

    Sticking to one joke in an unconscionably long film makes for a very stale, witless and repetitive comedy. Read full review

View more reviews for The 40-Year-Old Virgin on Metacritic

Information for Parents
Common Sense Media says Iffy for 16+ A one-joke sex comedy that is not for kids.
What Parents Need to Know Parents need to know that this movie is focused on a man's effort to lose his virginity. To that end, it leans heavily on verbal jokes and sight gags related to sex: crude slang for sexual activity, genitals, erections, bodily fluids, breasts, and dildos. By way of example: the first joke has to do with a woman having sex with a horse, though the language is much coarser and repetitive. The virgin and his three male coworkers/friends spend most of their time talking about sex, showing off or complaining about their conquests. They make homophobic remarks, go to bars and parties, ogle women (at one point, they see two girls kiss), play violent video games and watch violent (Dawn of the Dead [1978]) and pornographic movies. Women wear revealing outfits (one shows a nipple during a speed-date conversation), drink, drive badly, and throw up. Characters drink repeatedly, smoke pot, and curse frequently; one smokes cigarettes when he's depressed and another spends long minutes trying to put on a condom. Soundtrack features songs about sex and sexual desire (for instance, Missy Elliot's "Get Ur Freak On").
  • Families can talk about virginity as a "choice."
  • How does the movie make the case that, despite his friends' ribbing and his own embarrassment, the virgin represents a kind of romantic ideal, an earnest, awkward, sensitive man in search of a life partner?
  • Why is it significant that all the different men at the store -- Jewish, black, Pakistani, Caucasian -- behave equally badly around women? How does the movie represent women as peripheral or comic objects in relation to the self-centered but also sympathetic male characters?
  • How does Andy's dilemma serve as a metaphor for other, more often acknowledged forms of insecurity?
  • How does Andy learn to appreciate his difference, even as he tries so hard to "fit in"?
The good stuff
  • message true0 Positive messages: The virgin means well, but he and his friends are crude, lusty, and childish.
  • rolemodels true1 Positive role models: Even though this comedy is raunchy, Andy is a stand-up guy who is looking for more than just sex. Something rare in a sex comedy.
What to watch for
  • violence false3 Violence: Bloody violence on video and TV screens, as background; some antic mishaps (car crashes, bike accidents).
  • sex false5 Sexy stuff: Relentless and slangy discussion of sex, some comedic activity, including the appearance of a "trannie prostitute." Non-sexual nudity and same-sex kiss.
  • language false5 Language: Frequent cursing, vulgar references to genitalia and sex.
  • consumerism false3 Consumerism: Generic electronics, coffee, and drinks; specific toys, action figures, and movie/tv references; t-shirts reference bands (Sonic Youth, Public Enemy).
  • drugsalcoholtobacco false3 Drinking, drugs and smoking: Drinking, smoking, and pot-smoking.
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