Game Night: When fun becomes serious - unhealthy seriousness
Wacky, crazy and hilarious: a group of couples experience the night of bleeding dogs, the living dead and the most insane plan of all time: Game Night, it's on!
Warner Bros. invited me to a special screening of "Game Night" at Arena Cinemas in Zurich, and I answered the call. They had a "hot contender for comedy of the year" in their quiver. Somewhere in the invitation there is even talk of a "comedy smash hit". Anyone who throws around so many superlatives will know what they're doing.
I'm not impressed by the canapés and prosecco that are supposed to put us journalists in a cosy mood. Instead, I think again about the trailer, which has left me with a bland aftertaste. It's too reminiscent of the Adam Sandler school of pipe-breakers. Perhaps it was also due to the German dubbing.
I take my seat in theatre 1 with rather low expectations and let the comedy smash hit hit me. Then I'm pleasantly surprised.
The plot: promising
The game nights of ambitious couple Max (Jason Bateman) and Annie (Rachel McAdams) are legendary. Together with two befriended couples, they meet once a week in the ultimate battle of skill, knowledge and ability.
When Max's brother Brooks (Kyle Chandler), equipped with an oversized ego, invites the gamer friends to his villa and announces a very special game as a surprise, the anticipation is great: someone is to be kidnapped and the remaining players have to solve the kidnapping case. Hired FBI agents and gangsters will blur the boundaries between reality and fiction.
Suddenly, armed kidnappers storm the house and take the desperate Brooks with them. The friends are thrilled - after all, it's all part of the programme. Full of vigour, they take up the investigation, not suspecting that everything they experience that evening is just as unstaged as the kidnapping itself.
The humour: cleverer than you think
The first few minutes of the film promise a comedy that is cleverer and more imaginative than the trailer would suggest. No wonder, after all, directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein are avowed fans of parlour games. In the opening credits, for example, not only do the logos of the film studios Warner Bros. and New Line appear in the form of game pieces, but also legendary elements such as the rope from "Cluedo" or coloured corners from "Trivial Pursuit".
In terms of staging, the makers have really gone all out: shots from a bird's eye view are repeatedly interspersed, focussing so strongly on the foreground that houses and cars look as if you are looking down on a huge "Monopoly" or "Game of Life" board. And when the viewer is shown 360-degree tracking shots travelling around the group, it conveys the grandiose dynamics of a hard-fought game night.
In general, the film dispenses with infantile and below-the-belt gags. Thank you for that. Instead, it relies on outstanding actors such as Jason Bateman ("Arrested Development", "Zootopia") and Rachel McAdams ("Doctor Strange"). They harmonise perfectly and play the overly ambitious lead couple without becoming unsympathetic for a single second.
Hands-Down: A lot of comedic talent in a small space
Source: Jason Bateman mit seinem typischen, trockenen Humor.
In fact, directors Daley and Goldstein have not forgotten that a comedy is only as good as its characters. Bateman in particular deserves more recognition for his immense comedic talent throughout his career. After all, he is the one who puts his own personal stamp on the film. "Okay, roger that", says Bateman in his sarcastic, dry manner as gangsters threaten to shoot anyone who tries to follow them, "and you drive safe".
Bateman and McAdams are joined by an illustrious cast of actors and comedians that only die-hard connoisseurs will recognise: Kyle Chandler, whose better-known films include "Super 8" and Peter Jackson's "King Kong", plays the overbearing older brother without being annoying. And Billy Magnussen, with smaller roles in "Black Mass" and "The Big Short", plays the muscular pretty boy so wonderfully goofy that you can't help but take him to your heart.
But Jesse Plemons takes the cake.
Plemons already starred in the fifth season of "Breaking Bad", and he is currently giving fellow actor Billy Magnussen a run for his money in "Black Mirror". In "Game Night", he plays Gary, the creepy cop who has been abandoned by his wife and never takes off his uniform.
Gary wants nothing more than to be part of the game group. In his monotone cop voice, he accuses the couple Max and Annie of deliberately excluding him from the fun group (and he's right), and it's a treat for the audience to watch the two of them try to talk their way out of the mess with excuses - each more implausible than the last.
Hilarious to watch.
The bottom line: This is why you want to see the film
The lights come back on, and I'm surprised. Surprised because the film managed to make almost a hundred minutes fly by. This was not only due to its thoroughly convincing actors - above all Jason Bateman and the film's secret star Jesse Plemons - but also to the brisk staging and clever humour.
However, it is the third act that aims too high in terms of drama. Not for the first time since the sixth "Fast and Furious" instalment, the attempt to stop a plane taking off ended in an exaggerated action furioso. Less would clearly have been more here. The fact that every couple has to learn the usual "lesson of the day" in such films is also not very innovative.
So what: It's the little moments that have stayed with me. The scene where Bateman gets a bullet pulled out of his arm is so funny because the completely clueless and overwhelmed McAdams goes to the nearby supermarket to get items like - and I quote - "a lovely Chardonnay" to sanitise it. Or a rather counterproductive, squeaky dog toy to clamp between her teeth.
If the directing duo had concentrated more on this kind of humour and kept the reference to board games in the second and third acts more consistent, we would have actually seen a "hot contender for comedy of the year". As it is, we are left with a film that is not entirely without fault, but has its heart in the right place. After all.
Therefore: Go, see it!
I'm an outdoorsy guy and enjoy sports that push me to the limit – now that’s what I call comfort zone! But I'm also about curling up in an armchair with books about ugly intrigue and sinister kingkillers. Being an avid cinema-goer, I’ve been known to rave about film scores for hours on end. I’ve always wanted to say: «I am Groot.»