23November

{Movies} Lessons learned about FOF men from the new movie, About Fifty.

In the upcoming comedy, "About Fifty," Adam (played by Martin Grey Gottlieb) turns fifty and finds himself with a broken marriage and a dead-end career. To cheer him up, his best FOFriend, Jon, suggests they take a weekend trip to Palm Springs to re-live their younger days. At a steakhouse the first evening of their trip, Jon and Adam meet two FOFs. Despite setting out to meet younger ladies, they end up having a great time. When Jon and Adam cut the night short, Peggy, one of the FOFs, becomes furious. “They just stopped in for the steak; now they’re going to go out and see if they can get some real meat,” she says. “You don’t think I know what’s what? Believe me, your day is coming...”

Peggy is right, Jon and Adam’s day is more than just “coming”... it has arrived. Both men experience midlife crises on the trip. What ensues is a hilarious “coming of age story about coming of age,” and also an interesting look into the feelings and fears FOF men. Here are the top lessons we learned about FOF men from "About Fifty." Take notes and then, go see this laugh-out-loud movie for yourself!

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Topping Jon and Adam’s list of worries about getting older: colonscopies, bad backs and prostate cancer. They panic when their golf swings slow down. (Adam is horrified when the golf pro suggests he try the “senior shaft” golf club). They also worry about the new guys in their office out-performing them. (“Thanks for the swoosh!” says Jon’s 20-something-year-old co-worker Dan when he wins the Nike account, Jon’s former client.)

Almost every other scene Adam gets a call from his forgetful father. “Did you check in the freezer?” Adam asks his dad who loses his television remote control. “The TV’s not broken. You probably just hit the wrong button on the remote like last time,” he says to his dad in another scene. Sound familiar?

Instead of a tub of ice cream and a shoulder to cry on after a breakup or bad day, FOF men console each other with steak dinners and tough love. When Jon suggests to Adam they go on a golf outing for the weekend to cheer him up, Adam rejects the idea and continues to wallow in his sadness. “Want to hang yourself in the closet? Go ahead...” says Jon. “All you ever tell me is how miserable you are...this is an opportunity--you, me, a holiday weekend doing it the way we did it in the old days.” Adam grudgingly obliges and Jon lavishes him with a steak dinner, rounds of golf and even tries to set him up with an ex-fling’s best friend. When Jon finds out he has prostate cancer, Adam brings him his medicine and stocks his refrigerator but jokes, “I don’t give a sh*t about you. I stocked your fridge because I’m coming back in the morning for food.”

We don’t want to give too much away, but after landing a date with two FUFs, Jon likens it to “a gift from God” and Adam puts it best, when he says it’s more like “an episode of ‘To Catch a Predator.’”

FOF men don’t always have their dream careers figured out at 50, either. Towards the end of the movie, Adam, a struggling writer, comes to the conclusion that maybe he was never really meant to be a writer. “A key to life isn’t figuring out who you are, it’s figuring out who you aren’t,” he tells Jon.

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"About Fifty" is now playing in Palm Springs, Calif. and will be playing in select theaters in South Florida in December. It will be released on DVD and VOD on February 14, 2012.