This is a very hard movie to watch.
A masterclass in how to make the worst of any scenario.
How to unsuccessfully navigate suburbanity, masculinity, vanity, and the workplace.
Take comfort that you’ve never sunk to these lows. I thought the trailer gave the entire storyline away and it turns out it doesn’t. You just never know for sure where this film is going, although you squirm in your seat in dread anticipation.
An A24 film and the debut production by director Andrew De Young. What an outstanding career launch.
Craig, played by the deadpan and hysterically funny SNL veteran and creator of “I Think You Should Leave”, teaches us many lessons about being satisfied with the good fortune life brings you and how to respect boundaries. Not.
Fans of Anchorman will love the cameo with Paul Rudd staring as a moustached meteorologist yet again, the seemingly cool and cafefree Austin, newly neighboured to the awkward, socially inept Craig.
Craig feels trapped in his lonely life. So does his wife, played ruthlessly by Kate Mara, a cancer survivor and florist who nutures a weirdly intimate relationship with their teenage son and her ex, Devin. That’s just a taster on why we ought to feel squeamish, just wait until you see the toad.
His life opens up to wonderful new possibilities upon meeting Austin.
Mundane moments introduced by Austin are curiously amplified from Craig’s perspective. Whether it’s a creepy romp through tunnels just to enjoy an illegal ciggy from a civic balcony with an uneventful view, staring at an almost certainly counterfeit stone age spearhead, or watching an indie band play, Craig is jubilant at being invited into the life of this dynamic individual. Until he ruins it spectacularly.
Austin is not truly a person in Craig’s eyes. He represents a state of being he wishes to obtain and pursues in disastrous futility out of the belief Austin is the answer to his stifling existence.
Cruelly relatable at times, unless you’re one of those blessed rare people who has never felt like a spare part.
The slow camera zoom and soundtrack are perfect for heralding nefarious deeds to come. The tribalistic chanting and hints of opera are seeded throughout the film to brilliant effect.
This dark cringe comedy had me placing my face in my hands regularly and growling at the screen. You can count on Craig to choose the wrong decision pretty much every time. He never sees the irony in his occupation of middle management at a company dedicated to designing smartphone apps that fuel addictive dependency in consumers. It’s as if he’s never taken the time to observe how real humans behave. We are able to guess why after it all wraps up.
It had the screener audience at Luna Leederville in raucous, guffawing laughter regularly. Same goes for me, but mostly I was frozen there in mortified silence for Craig, willing him to read the room.
Eight out of ten stars.
Best watched with a friend!
* By Gayle O’Leary. If you’d like to catch up on more by Gayle here on Fremantle Shipping News, look right here!
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