Game Night (2018)

Though all art and entertainment is subjective, few genres are as subjective as comedies. Most people enjoy laughing, but finding The Hangover funny does not necessarily mean you will find Meatballs funny or any Mel Brooks movie funny. And, despite the collective social groan at the new Epic Movie or Superhero Movie or Scary Movie, there are people that genuinely find that stuff amusing. Point here being, reviewing a comedy is sometimes trickier than examining a drama because comedy is one of the most subjective things out there.

In that vein, Game Night is an even stranger film to look at. In many ways, its cinematic experience parallels that of the characters within the movie: "what is going on?" was a frequent question on my mind while watching it, except not for narrative reasons it is going for.

Centered on a group of friends and their traditional "game night," they are brought into a confusing murder mystery game that coincides with an actual kidnapping. There's even a third angle that comes into play later that further confuses what is real versus what is staged. The story and comedy is built around this premise. It seems the goal of the filmmaker is to confound audience members as much as it does its own characters.

The problem, then, is that the characters never seem all that confounded themselves. Yet the film is itself a confusing mixture of - often - awesome elements. There are scene transitions that visually look like it is all happening on a game board, which looks neat and is surprisingly interesting for Hangover-esque comedy. There are also sequences edited almost like an Edgar Wright film, with fast cuts to depict the passing of time that, again, feel surprisingly unique for a basic comedy. Or, there's also an incredible synth-based score throughout the entire feature that is both amazing to listen to and amazingly out of place within the film. 

And, of course, there's the cast. With Rachel McAdams and Jason Bateman as its leads, there should be little reason for these characters to lack charm or charisma. Yet no one really stands out except for Jesse Plemons (the actor quickly taking up the role of "best actor you see in everything but have no idea what his name is"), and even he stands out largely by playing a completely one-dimensional creepy neighbor. Game Night also features the biggest waste of Danny Huston since X-Men Origins: Wolverine. 

The ultimate problem is that the script just isn't that funny. There are funny scenes, sure. To suggest I didn't laugh at all would be incorrect. To be sure, I came to realize that I have underestimated McAdams's comedic chops. But a lot of the comedy falls flat because there aren't really any compelling characters. The most interesting narrative element is in the fact that they never give anyone other than Bateman's character an arc. They appear to give others cliche development, but wind up dropping it just after they telegraph where it's going. It could be a sort of meta-joke, playing on audience expectations for a little laugh. Then again, it could just be sloppy writing.

Game Night highlights that a film isn't always just a sum of its parts. There are many interesting or intriguing aspects to the film, yet it never amounts to anything more. By no means is it the worst movie of the year or one of the worst comedies in a while, but even if you liked it, there's likely not much of a chance you'll ever revisit it.

Reductive Rating: It's fine, I guess.