Even with the amount of hatred I’ve been able to generate
over the pretty awful films I’ve covered over the last few years, I have rarely
if ever been ungrateful for having sat through them myself. I say that because
even the worst films still have enough good grace to give me things to dissect
and write about. In fact, it is usually the bad ones that give me the
most material, as blind fury is often an easier feeling to express than
anything pleasant. This entire blog exists because of my own love for film and writing about film, so I'd be a bit stupid if I was entirely ungrateful for the films that give me the best material to work with. Hell, I'd even go so far as to say that some of my best work has come out of the more egregiously awful films that I've sat through.
However, every so often, there comes a film that is so bland, so
dull, so not engaging that I am left struggling to properly articulate how I
truly feel about the work. We’ve unfortunately got another one of those today
so, as you read this, understand that every single word on this page was
wrung out of my brain with quite a bit of effort. tl;dr Sorry if this review
turns out too boring to slog through.
The plot: Recently broken-up and now former bridesmaid
Eloise (Anna Kendrick), possibly against her best wishes, decides to go to her
best friend’s wedding. Unfortunately, she has been seated at the ‘loser’s table’
with nanny Jo (June Squibb), bickering couple Jerry (Craig Robinson) and Bina
(Lisa Kudrow), parolee Walter (Stephen Merchant) and awkward teen Renzo (Tony
Revolori). As they sit through the proceedings, and wondering why they even showed
up in the first place, they come to some sort of conclusion after they start
bonding. I say “some sort of conclusion” because I don’t think there’s enough
actual plot here to warrant an actual conclusion to anything.
The cast here is, frankly, depressing to see. Between the occupants of the titular table, there’s at least 10 good
or even great films that I’ve seen these people in over the years. I know for a
fact that these are people capable of delivering the goods, which makes it even
more heartbreaking that they are all as flat as they are here
Kendrick is
trying admirably with the thin role she’s given, and all the credit to her that
she’s showing as much emotion as she is, but that’s where the good ends,
really. Robinson and Kudrow are pretty bland as your standard argumentative
couple, Squibb barely has a presence outside of being the most visibly old person
at the table, Revolori is given raging hormones as his character and he pushes
that button for all it’s worth (which apparently isn’t that much) and Merchant
is even worse in how one-note he is; he’s basically a walking punchline with
how badly he’s hiding the fact that he left prison to be at the wedding, and
that’s about as funny as he gets. I’d get into the other actors but, quite
frankly, the mains are depressing me enough as is so let’s just move the hell
on.
With an initial story credit given to the Duplass brothers,
the kingpins of indie quirk, it’s little wonder that this film is as awkward as
it is in terms of dialogue and general events. What is something of a wonder is that the comedy is this fucking weak
and desperate. With a running time that doesn’t even reach 90 minutes, this is
less lean and trimmed to perfection and more aimless wandering around its own
plot trying to find something for the characters to do. The supposed comedy of
the dialogue exists solely in its awkwardness, except it’s being channelled
through words that no right-headed human would actually say in real life. When
it gets to the point where a character is just declaring that he has an
enormous penis (in front of Andy Daly, who has somehow found a worse film to be
in this year than Middle School), it sinks in that this film is just flailing
around in a feeble attempt to amuse.
No, actually, strike that: the real point where that comes across is
once you start taking note of how often characters will just randomly trip and
fall over for literally no reason. It’s less slapstick and more boomstick, in
that this wedding desperately needs a shotgun for anything worthwhile to take
place.
The story is incredibly weak, but then again, that’s no
surprise coming from the Duplass brothers. Their entire niche in American
independent filmmaking is built on an emphasis of character and dialogue as
opposed to strict narrative. As filtered through writer/director Jeffrey Blitz,
though, that seems to translate as “let’s make a third-rate Breakfast Club
knock-off”. I know that similar claims have been made concerning Power Rangers
from earlier this year, but quite frankly, this is way more blatant in that regard. From the initial meetup of people
who are at the given place either through bad decisions or just lack of judgement,
to the eventual outpouring of inner turmoil induced to the surface through
smoking weed, right down to the somewhat stilted pairing-off at the end; this
isn’t even trying to hide it. Again, I should reiterate that mimicry in film
isn’t an automatically bad thing; hell, The Breakfast Club is my all-time
favourite film so homages to that aren’t exactly going to make me hate a film
any more than I already do.
No, what makes this bad is how it’s done with
literally none of the punch or flavour of that film or any of its previous
copycats. We have characters very stiffly stating their motivations, their
issues and their connections to other characters, all without actually
solidifying their own characters in the process. The only one who comes close
is Eloise, and even then her own drama is brought about through means that I
honestly thought were just being brought up as a cheap joke… until I realized
that the film was being dead serious. She even gets a clichéd rom-com conclusion
involving a ferry and a very long swim whose triteness is matched only by the
fact that it all happens off-bloody-screen.
With the general conceit involving what is essentially the
rejects table, made up of people who are either invited out of apathetic
necessity or as a result of some wrong-headed idea about how weddings usually
turn out, the film seems to want to make some kind of pro-outsider statement
through the characters. I think. I
honestly can’t tell if that is an actual intent of the production or if that’s
just my own brain trying to cling onto any form of subtext that it can work
with because, as you may have already noticed, this film is incredibly
underwhelming.
And it didn’t even need to be this way! All the right pieces
seem to be in place with the casting, and the mere idea of an uncomfortable
wedding opens itself up for quite a few possibilities for comedy and even
drama, and yet Blitz appears to be either unwilling or unable to deliver on any
of it. We get a few glimpses at actual humanity here, like with the Kepps’
marital issues, Renzo’s parental concerns and even Walter’s naïve meekness, but
it’s all drowned out in a script that feels more comfortable with awkward
silence than awkward literally-anything-else. Seriously, Eloise constantly
changing her mind on the wedding RSVP at the very start is as complex as this film gets in terms
of character actions.
All in all, this has all the dreariness, boredom and
drawn-out forced pleasantries of an actual wedding, only without the free booze
and free food to make it seem like you didn’t completely waste your time. A well-intended but still badly
utilized cast, a story that is too basic to seemingly give the writer/director
enough to work with and an approach to comedy that is more sad to see unfold
than anything else, this is a film that literally has no reason to exist. For
all the flak I gave A Dog’s Purpose in how dull it was, this is an even bigger
offender in that regard. Even for a light-weight comedy, you could throw a dart
in a rental store and find something that’s worth watching more than this.
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