Delayed Reaction: Made

The Pitch: Swingers 2. This time, with mafia connections.

Swingers is a fun movie. I saw it several years ago and mainly remember it for the epic meltdown when Jon Favreau's Mike leaves all those messages on that poor woman's answering machine. Made is the spiritual sequel to Swingers and it feels like it. The stand out parts of Swingers (namely, Fareau and Vince Vaughn's dynamic) get brought along and the story is a little more ambitious. It's Jon Favreau's directorial debut. That sounds about right. The direction is pretty simple. I'd rather have a debut direction be simple and invisible rather than experimental and distracting. Favreau as a director is fun to track. The man is good at it, even if I can't put my finger on what he does. What do Made, Elf, Iron Man, Chef, and The Jungle Book have in common? A director who can disappear into his work, perhaps? Vince Vaughn is putting on the full Vince Vaughn in this. He is an actor I like best as a supporting character (even in Wedding Crashers, he was very prominent but second to Owen Wilson in the narrative). Made pushes about as hard as it can on the amount before Vaughn becomes irritating. If he didn't play off Favreau so well, it would be much less watchable.
While I think the ending was a bit clunky, the credits scene at Chuck-e-Cheese was wonderful.

Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend