Rachel McAdams is comedic freight train. This is the best comedy since 21 Jump Street.
“A group of friends who meet regularly for game nights find themselves trying to solve a murder mystery.”
Everyone has that couple in their life that can’t stand to lose at anything. You know the type of people that are so competitive it drives you insane, but it also brings out the competitive nature in yourself. Well meet Annie (Rachel McAdams) and Max (Jason Bateman) the most competitive couple in the history of rom-coms. Meeting at bar trivia night, they host a weekly game night with their close knit group of friends. When things start to become stale and routine for the event, in comes Max’s much cooler brother Brooks (Kyle Chandler) to spice things up. Being the super competitive person he is, Max is always trying to one up his brother in game night but also in life. Feeling he has never achieved this, he is feeling pressures in his every day life to live up to his almighty brother.
I went back several years to see comedies that have recently come out, and to be quite honest, it was slim pickings to find one that really stuck with me. I had to go all the way back to 21 Jump Street to find a movie that made me laugh this hard in theatres. Game Night is the perfect movie, I couldn’t think of one flaw in the whole thing. Unlike most comedies these days, that rely way to much on poop, or dick jokes to get through the movie, Game Night just relies on one hell of a script. It’s tight and so well constructed, that all the jokes come so naturally, it really makes you respect the film even more. You’ve seen the trailers, Brooks invites the whole gang over for a “game night they’ll never forget.” When he plans a murder mystery party that goes awol, the rest of the guests need to figure out what’s real and what’s not. Action comedies have been done before, but sometimes you find what is happening isn’t occurring organically and feels almost forced. This is not the case here, everything happening feels so organic and happens so naturally, and that’s what makes the movie so damn funny. The other two couples at the party, Ryan (Billy Magnussen) and his British date Sarah (Sharon Horgan). Ryan tends to bring a new girl to game night every week, the only person in the group not in a relationship, but this time around he brings a “ringer” in Sarah. They work off each other incredibly, him being the dumb idiot, while she is quick witted and very educated. It was great watching them bounce jokes off one another and slowly fall for each other, despite being polar opposites. We have the couple who has been together since grade school, Kevin (Lamorne Morris) and Michelle (Kylie Bunbury) who also work incredibly well together. During game night they play a game of “never have I ever,” and when she reveals she had slept with a celebrity when they were on a two week break. Watching Kevin trying to figure out who, and the ultimate reveal was INCREDIBLE.
This is situational comedy at its finest. Like I said, there aren’t bad one liners, corny jokes about bodily fluids, everything just feels so right within this movie. Action comedies always feel the need to start off really funny, and then have the action go from 0-100 real quick, well that’s not what happens here. Everything you see feels like it needed to happen in order to progress the story further along, and even the cast themselves realize how crazy things are getting. There are certain moments in this movie that I find myself laughing about days later. That’s always a sign of a great comedy. Now there are two stand outs of the movie. First is Jesse Plemons who plays Gary, the next door neighbour who no longer gets invited to game night. You see, Gary is kind of an odd duck, a police officer, he is going through a divorce and just wants to be part of game night again. He wants to be reunited with his friends, but every scene that Jesse is in, he is stealing the show. He plays his role to perfection, that awkward, deadpan neighbour, who has zero social skills. I was shocked and pleasantly surprised by his comedic skills. Next, Rachel McAdams in my opinion gives the best performance of her career. I know she was nominated for Spotlight, which she is fantastic in, but she is unbelievable in Game Night. It’s been a long time since she’s got to do comedy, and she’s kind of just been floating around lately. She had a ton of fun making this movie, you can tell by her performance, and I’m really happy for her.
I knew Game Night was going to be enjoyable and I would laugh, but I never thought I would feel this way about it. It’s honestly the perfect movie, and it would be great for a date night. There is a solid stretch of about 30-40 minutes which is so enjoyable and so funny, I couldn’t believe it. Paced well, never falters and actually leaves you guessing till the very end. You yourself don’t even know what’s real and what’s fake until the very end of the movie. This is the comedy that not enough people will see, and once it hits Netflix everyone will be going crazy over it, so do yourself a favour and get out to your local theatre and support this gem. Still can’t get over how good Rachel McAdams is in this movie.
Check ya later.
Nate’s Movie Tour Review – Game Night = 97/100
