Checked out the deviously fun new flick A Simple Favor. This is somehow the new Paul Feig murder mystery suspense film starring Anna Kendrick and Blake Lively. I saw a trailer for this once but I think it was being advertised elsewhere since it was pretty packed over a couple different showings.
This is very much like what would happen if a film like Gone Girl or Girl on the Train – dark, slightly trashy suspense / murder mysteries – starred a romantic comedy character at the center. Anna Kendrick is in peak Anna Kendrick mode… a cute, adorkable flighty comedian inserted into a Missing Woman narrative that everyone else is playing pretty straight. It’s a cool and surprising twist on a genre that’s usually very serious (when its not being tawdry and trashy).
Kendrick is a hyperactive go-getter mommy-blogger who runs into hyper-sophisticated, acerbic fashionista Blake Lively. They both have kids at the same school so while the young ones have a play date, their moms get liquored up and chat themselves into a somewhat one-sided friendship. Then Lively vanishes after getting Kendrick to watch her son. Lively’s husband – Henry Golding just off Crazy Rich Asians – is left wondering also what happened to his wife. Did he kill her? Did she commit suicide? Is this all some kind of setup? What do the police think, especially when Kendrick starts babbling under questioning?
This is a wickedly fun and surprisingly funny film. Yes, it’s a little bit trashy but in a fun way. It’s great mixing a suspense film with a romantic comedy vibe and Kenrick and Lively are peak themselves. As if they each took their public persona and amped it up to eleven and they play themselves with genuine abandon. They make the movie and they make the movie fun.
The movie does have the problem of a lot of Paul Feig movies though. It goes on and on a few too many scenes. It could have been cut a little shorter and avoided a fairly messy and overly complicated, overly talky ending. He does this with his comedies as well but at least in a mystery film, it isn’t as egregious.
So, yeah, color me surprised watching the film and genuinely laughing and also laughing at its crafty, strategic trashiness. Both are thoroughly entertaining and you gotta love both Kendrick and Lively equally. Really good film… for most of its runtime.
Score: 84