This! This right here is what I mean when I say that Netflix is for bottom of the pile projects. In a lot of ways, Netflix has been a godsend for film production. In an attempt to fast-track their reputation as a respectable studio, Netflix has thrown money at major filmmakers and producers to work with them. This seems to happen in one of two ways. The first is that they tell the filmmaker they will make that ambitious project that every other studio in town has turned down due to expense or lack of commerciality. The second is that they throw money at the filmmaker to make anything. In the first group, you have things like The Irishman or Roma. In the second you have Christopher Guest making Mascots or the Adam Sandler deal. Either way, there’s a feeling that Netflix is making something other studios have rejected or something the filmmakers don’t think is worth bringing to the studios. Hence, bottom of the pile projects.
I love Judd Apatow’s movies. As a producer, I think he’s one of the defining voices of the 2000s. I loved his early films when he was giving overdue star vehicles to the likes of Steve Carrell and Seth Rogen. I loved his deeply personal films like Funny People and This is 40. I’ve liked his more recent films where he lent his talents to someone else’s project (Trainwreck, The King of Staten Island). Never question my love of Judd Apatow’s work.
With that said, The Bubble is by far the weakest movie he’s been this involved with. I don’t know the specifics of how it came about, but this is how I imagine it. Late 2020, Apatow heard about the filming of Jurassic World Dominion and thought, “That could be a funny idea for a movie: a movie about shooting a movie in quarantine”. It wasn’t a fully formed idea. He brought it to Netflix, who had been calling him, asking him to do anything for them. Netflix immediately said yes. Like, they didn’t even stop to ask him what it was about. They just said yes. Now Apatow is on the hook for a movie that’s still being written. It’s going to be about the pandemic despite not knowing what the fallout of it would really be. He gets together whatever mix of people he can. Obviously, his wife and daughter are on board*. He’s heard Karen Gillan is always game to be funnier in stuff. He casts a net for any familiar stars who want to sign on and reels in David Duchovny, Keegan-Michael Key, and Pedro Pascal. He signs on a few rising comedy stars that not everyone has heard of like Maria Bakalova and Guz Khan. Finally, he sets up a few Zoom and real-life cameos. That’s enough for a movie.
*I adore Leslie Mann and think Iris Apatow has a lot of potential. She’s very good in Netflix’s Love. That said, Judd Apatow has some of the most transparent nepotism in his projects. They are good, but it is funny to laugh at it.
It’s hard to pick a single reason why The Bubble doesn’t work. The movie is absolutely too self-aware. It’s a movie about making a movie. It stars actors who made this movie in a bubble commenting on how annoying it is to make a movie in a bubble. It tries to comment on both how hard it is to be in a bubble and how actors still have it so much easier than everyone else. It’s mocking actors complaining about the hardships while also putting exaggerated hardships on them. This movie tries to make way too many points at the same time.
COVID humor has been a tough egg to crack. TV and film are by nature slow. This movie was written sometime in 2020 or early 2021. Filming was completed by April 2021. That was a lifetime ago in the COVID cycle. A year later, none of the COVID humor of the movie works. Dozens of other projects have done the same jokes about going stir crazy inside, not liking the nasal swab, and the existence of a secret vaccine that all the rich people got first. It’s responding too directly to COVID-19 without the value of hindsight. There’s genuinely nothing clever about it. The reason a movie like Tropic Thunder is able to work is because even in its commentary, it’s responding to general trends, not exact one. The Bubble hopes that jokes that worked in late 2020 will still work over a year later. There’s a reason why the best timely humor exists on late night shows. They can make the jokes before they get worn out. The Bubble is a sketch from the end of a Last Week Tonight episode that has been stretched into an entire movie a year late.
Not to pile on, but the stuff commenting on the movie industry in general isn’t that great either. Judd Apatow is a filmmaker who has been able to work for 20+ years making increasingly personal projects. It’s weird to watch a movie from the guy who got to make This Is 40 that’s complaining about how the Hollywood machine only makes tired blockbusters. A small change in this that I think could’ve made all the difference is if the scenes of Cliff Beasts 6 (the movie within the movie) actually looked competent. Isn’t it more interesting if there’s a contrast between the onscreen product and what’s going on behind the scenes? Then, when a scene falls apart because of a production mistake or an actor’s ego taking over, it’s more effective. Even a stupid blockbuster is competent. This was based on a Jurassic World COVID production. I haven’t liked the Jurassic World movies, but the problem with them is that they are 15-20% away from being great, not that they look cheap. The idea of The Bubble is that Karen Gillan’s character returning to the Cliff Beasts franchise is going to be a boon for her career, but Cliff Beast 6 looks like a straight to DVD sequel from its inception. Think about the biggest flops. The problem isn’t that they look like Ed Wood movies. The problem with a Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore is that is looks like an expensive, professionally-made movie yet all the structural parts are off slightly, from the story to performances.
The most telling and damning thing about The Bubble is that by far, my favorite parts were the TikTok dance segments. And that kind of proves my point. Those are the only time in the movie when anyone seems competent. They are being ridiculous but everyone is hitting their marks. It’s the only time when I believe that any of these people could actually be movie stars. It’s a lot like Michael Scott on The Office. That show is mostly a joke, but a couple times a season, Michael Scott would do something to remind you how he got his job. They show that he really is an amazing salesman. I needed those moments to make his most insane moment works. The Bubble only has the insanity. There’s none of the grounding.
Verdict: Strongly Don’t Recommend
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