When will some writer figure out how to bridge Rudd’s capacity for adolescent nonsense and real adult rage. His anger is always so clear-eyed and his comic delivery so certain that he would be perfect for a great social satire. Instead, he is spinning his wheels, alongside Aniston, whose undervalued sense of comedy movies still do not know what to do with.

Linda and George have moved to the commune because it seems easier than the rat race. For a moment it feels as if “Wanderlust’’ might be trying to get at what Albert Brooks went after in “Lost in America,’’ this cynical generational anthem about ambition, failure, and begging to be let back into Eden. Of course, having reread what I just wrote, all I can do is laugh since, based on what transpires in “Wanderlust,’’ the part of Brooks’s great farce that appears to have resonated with Wain and Marino is “lost.’’

Wesley Morris can be reached at Wmorris@globe.com.