Here's the thing about Cedar Rapids. I like it. It's well written, well crafted and just generally pleasant to watch. It's got a solid cast, all of them doing things they're good at. Other than Ed Helms having sex with Sigourney Weaver, which he's not very good at, but that's kind of the point. But that said, as pleasant an experience as it is, I don't think it's the movie that it set out to be.

This is a movie built like it's a big, in-your-face comedy. A movie where people are goofy and completely unrealistic all in the name of giving you big belly laughs that hurt a bit the next day. It's a movie that has Ed Helms playing the world's most naive man-child, John C. Reilly playing a loudmouthed drunken lout prone to swimming fully clothed and The Wire's Isiah Whitlock delivering a monologue in the style of a different character from The Wire. It has the guy who plays Red in That 70's Show giving Ed Helms a naked hug. Christ, it's a movie about a guy sent to an insurance convention as a last minute replacement when the guy who was supposed to go dies in an auto-erotic asphyxiation accident and the guy -- the guy who goes, not the guy who's dead -- considers this one of the most exciting events of his life. And if that doesn't tip you off that we're living in a comedy fantasy land then I don't know what possibly could.

Except it's not funny. Not really. Not laugh-out-loud funny other than a couple little bits. Reilly is too tragic to be a funny drunk. Whitlock too lonely for giggles. Anne Heche -- who I haven't mentioned yet but who is really, really good in this -- too disillusioned. And so we're left with naive man-boy Ed Helms wandering around in this too-real world and I'm just not sure what to do with him. It doesn't feel like two movies competing with each other, it just feels like director Miguel Arteta didn't really give a damn about making a comedy at the end of the day and he forgot to tell the marketers as much and we're left with a movie that's being sold as one thing when really it's something else and that something else doesn't really fit with expectations in any direction.

So here's the story: Ed Helms is Tim Lippe, a man creeping up on middle age while living a quiet, mostly solitary life. His relationship with his former grade school teacher is clearly a naive attempt to replace the mother he lost too young. He's never traveled, never done much of anything, he just lives his life in the same small town that he grew up in while working for the insurance brokers who helped him through childhood tragedy. Tim is so bland that even in the bland world of insurance he fades into the background. That is until the bright star of the firm dies on the eve of an important industry conference and Tim is sent in his place. Cue hyper-religious industry leader, the mother of two looking for a little something on the side while away from husband and kids, the chronically drunk pseudo-rival, the small town hooker with a heart of gold, etc.

It's an odd one, Cedar Rapids. It never quite goes where you expect it to go and where the marketing campaign has worked hard to tell you it is going to go. But the entire cast is so strong -- hell, even Rob Corddry, who I normally hate, is acceptable in it -- that it's hard to get too upset by that. These people may not have made me laugh but I recognized them and I liked them and I enjoyed my time with them. I didn't love it but it was a pleasant time out. And there's nothing particularly wrong with that.