Premise: Two middle-aged best friends go on a Floridian vacation where they happen upon a diabolical plot to kill everyone.
Dammit. I really wanted to be on the fun side of this movie. Good luck finding a bigger Bridesmaids fan than me. I've been rooting hard for everything with Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo have done. When this movie came out, all the discussion around it was filled with giddy joy. I really wanted to have a silly good time with this movie.
Unfortunately, while I appreciated what the movie was doing, I was not at all on its wavelength.
From the very first trailer, it was clear that this was a gamble. That colorful trailer with the kid on the bike. Barb and Star rambling on, self-obliviously about the trailer they are in and how it's not showing what they look like. The trailer was too cute by half and I couldn't imagine those characters not wearing thin after 90 minutes.
The movie is unapologetically what it is. Wiig and Mumolo came in with a plan and executed it. I fully believe they made the movie they intended to: a silly joke machine that doesn't quit. And here's where I must admit something that will lose me some friends. I don't like Airplane! that much. It's not my style. I don't care for throwing joke after joke at an audience, hoping they laugh at one long enough to forget the 5 that failed. Sure, 30 Rock is my favorite show of all time, but that show mixes in tons of jokes into a proper story. Barb and Star is aware of when its jokes are bad and tries to use that to make them good. Sort of like how bad puns are good sometimes just because the person had the audacity to make them in the first place.
It also doesn't help that I don't like Wiig's character work. I came back into SNL at the tail end of her run, and while I love Wiig, I was very ready for her to leave. She loves these big characters, and I could barely make it through a single sketch before the Target Lady became too much. Barb and Star is a Kristen Wiig character stretched out for an entire movie. Technically two Wiig characters, and a third Wiig character played by Mumolo. I didn't find enough depth in any of them. Jamie Dornan is a great himbo in this too, but like Jon Hamm before him, the willingness to be funny is only half the battle. I believe he'd be funny in future movies he may choose to make. I wasn't a fan of his comedy in this.
Also, does this all feel like an easy target to anyone else? It's taking down boring middle-aged midwestern people who treat Florida beach towns like Shangri-La. A lot of tough targets there. Maybe I'm too close to it. I'm nearly Midwestern. I'm catching up to middle-age. My ideal vacation is Disney World. I'm basic, I guess. But there's something about the combination of it all in the movie that bothers me. Wiig and Mumolo come from the Northeast and California. There isn't any sense of specificity to Nebraska or Vista Del Mar in the movie. It's just sort of, "small town mid-westerners and Florida vacation towns sure are tacky, huh?" Those shorthands have been done to death at this point. I wouldn't've minded as much if the humor of the movie worked for me more. Since it didn't, I had too much time to focus on how much was punching down. I guess I should just be happy they didn't make them from Indiana like every other show and movie does.
I suck. I am the wet blanket here. I get that. More power to you if the movie works for you. I can see why people would compare it favorably to Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion. It's a similar "best friends against the world" vibe, which I want to like. I just plain didn't though. Similar to Airplane! even a good hit rate on jokes for a structure I fundamentally find tedious can't save the movie.
Verdict: Weakly Don't Recommend
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