Aaron's Thoughts
Sundance 2025 #3
A film so focused on trying to mimic the tone & style of Wes Anderson that it ends up being too idiosyncratic to be laugh out loud funny & too messy to ever clearly say what it wants.
When Dave Franco shows up in the second act, you get the best 10 minutes of the film & a glimpse at what the film could have been from start to finish. It’s the only time throughout the painfully long 95 minute runtime where you feel connected to the characters & don’t resort to sympathy chuckles but actually laugh uncontrollably. Some of that is at the script level, but some of it is also that Dave Franco is bringing a comedic energy that no other member of the cast ever comes close to.
Sure, the themes needed to be fleshed out more clearly in the screenplay, but above all there needed to be actors (outside of Franco & a one minute scene with Steven Yeun) that could comedically deliver such zany material or at least a director that better understood how to best get such performances out of his cast.
