The other major Mother’s Day release is the new Melissa McCarthey comedy Life of the Party. If the audience has anything to say about it, women will go see it and find it hilarious. As the female half of the couple who walked out ahead of me said, “I think you were the only guy in there” (didn’t see me, I guess) and, as a group of ladies said, “That was one of the funniest movies I’ve seen”. I disagree. But the crowd has spoken and they laughed a lot… I struggle to see what was so funny. Sigh.
A movie can be funny regardless of who it’s targeted at. A female-led or focused comedy can still be funny to men. But I didn’t find this flick remotely funny. I kept seeing things that were clearly meant to be jokes… but finding nothing remotely funny in them. While the rest of the audience did. So who knows? Maybe it’s the best movie EVAR!
Anyhow, McCarthey plays a mom who is sending her daughter back to college when she gets a surprise divorce request from her husband. Realizing she’d put her college career on hold for him, she decides to go back to school and get her diploma (in archaeology, for some reason). Thus we have a “older person goes back to school” story that, in this day of remakes, amazes me wasn’t a remake of Rodney Dangerfield’s Back to School. But, to be fair, except for the premise, the plot and characters are not at all like the Dangerfield movie.
I could go into the lack of stakes or what you could call drama or meaningful plot here… the movie has a certain lack of focus and just a desire to tell a lot of stereotypical college jokes… but I guess none of that really would matter since this comedy just wasn’t funny. This flaw is so much bigger than whether or not McCarthey can afford school or if she can steer clear of the mean girls or whatever. Yes, there’s script problems but, really, who cares?
One thing I did like about the film is that her daughter and her friends are surprised McCarthey shows up for school… but they aren’t bitchy or mortified by it. There’s a certain level of sisterhood (parenthood?) to their relationships that did surprise me. They avoided some cliches and made it a story about a surprise family… the mama bear and her cubs, kind of thing. Even the previously mentioned mean girls aren’t all that mean… or important to whatever plot there is.
So, yeah, I was unimpressed by the movie for its lack of chuckles… however, I may be wrong. Based on the audience reaction, I sure may be. I dunno. Maybe I should have stayed home.
Score: 66