Bad date movies don’t exist. The couple can always make out instead. Forgetting Sarah Marshall falls into this category. Don’t follow this reviewer and watch it alone. Unfortunately, everyone else will be getting a payoff at the end of the night while you’re the one left with a headache and a feeling of lost time.

Peter Bretter(Jason Segel) leads an almost too comfortable life. A composer, he lays down moody tracks for a CSI-like TV crime drama while eating cereal out of mixing bowls. He’s also a lucky man, dating the show’s star, Sarah Marshall (Kristin Bell). One morning, she dumps him for rocker Aldous Snow (Russell Brand). To recover from the breakup, he vacations in Hawaii. Coincidentally, he winds up staying at the same hotel as Sarah and Aldous. Thankfully, the hotel’s front desk clerk, Rachel Jansen (Mila Kunis) sees more promise in Peter than Sarah.

For lowbrow stories with heart, you normally seek out Judd Apatow. Lately though, he’s been producing more than directing.While not as bad as Drillbit Taylor, this Hawaiian vacation movie is a bumpy ride. As a producer, Apatow needs to stop looking like he’s doing favors for people who have worked for him. This is Segel’s and Nicholas Stoller’s first time as writer and director, respectively, and it shows. Apatow needs to choose people who’ll nurture his brand of realism and gag humor. When he produced Superbad, director Greg Motolla was a great choice. In that film, all the young actors gave honest performances. Writers Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg adapted their childhood experiences for the screen. But, last summer was a long time ago.

Aside from bitchy blondes and fuzzy-haired slobs, Sarah Marshall is barely an Apatow film. Its story is repetitive, routine, and really unfunny. Its 112-minute runtime doesn’t help. A two-hour comedy with Apatow’s name attached to it usually spells entertainment. Instead, we have a standard 90-minute romantic comedy that is 20 minutes too long. Weak, improvised dialogue only adds to its unbearable length. Everybody’s dry on one-liners here. The normally hyperactive Jonah Hill chokes as a hotel café waiter. Paul Rudd’s stoner surf instructor character tries to cheer Peter up by singing a horrible rendition of “Let it Snow.” “Oh, the weather outside is — weather,” he croons. Give me a break.

That Peter will rise from misery to bliss is never in doubt. The first woman he meets in Hawaii is Rachel, his perfect love. She is more or less required to be in love with him. Trivial actions or dialogue are major relationship builders. Don’t you wish you could butter up your mad girlfriend by wearing a clean shirt? Toward the finale, Rachel rejects Peter after learning he let Sarah make a pass at him. Merely by inviting her to his play, Peter receives a full pardon. By comparison, the hero in Knocked Up, Ben Stone, really changed his life to win back Alison Scott.