When a movie starts with two friends deciding to have a kid and stay friends, am I the only person who knew it would end with them getting together? Attempting to explore the effect kids have on your life on your friendships, your love life and your mind the film often fails in that for a comedy, it isn’t very funny. That’s not to say that it’s a total train-wreck humour-wise, but it has difficulty keeping a smile on your face long enough to keep you invested.
The relationships generally feel realistic; even if the friendship group doesn’t make a lot of sense and the ensemble cast mostly resolves down to the two main characters within the first half hour. The cast are good without being exceptional. The two leads (Adam Scott and Jennifer Westfeld) start off as an interesting friendship but become boring rom-com stereotypes by the end. Jon Hamm stands out for the range he covers in a limited role, but that may just be left over love from Mad Men, mixed with his undeniable handsomeness. None of the actors are particularly terrible either, but they fail to make much of an impression, I can hardly even remember their names.
The direction is nothing special, scenes of the gang hanging out work well with sweeping cameras helping the conversation flow, but these are rare occasions. The nature of the story, covering several years with relationships changing means that the cast kind of come and go. By the end most scenes solely feature the leads, and their friends are almost forgotten. As a result no real closure is given to their stories, which are fairly slight as it is.
The whole thing is pretty predictable, relationships end and others start. It’s actually quite irritating as you can easily guess the ending and how we’re going to get there which means that most of the middle feels like total filler. The ending is actually quite frustrating as after all the screwing around the resolution feels too simple and you’re left to interpret what happens after.
Overall Verdict: A predictable, unfunny film that’s a bit of a mess.
Special Features:
Audio commentary with Jennifer Westfeld, Jon Hamm and William Rexer
Making Friends With Juds
Ad-libs and bloopers
Reviewer: Matt Mallinson