vesil_vesalier
It amazes me sometimes, when I miss the comedy in movies labeled as comedies. On occasion, it has to do with time. Take NETWORK (1976), for example. According to the listing, it was supposed to be a dark comedy. What it turned into was an appropriation of the future, a future that we are now stuck in, so all of the humor is lost.It's been a long time since I watched this film, and so it's possible I won't be able to grasp it's higher functions (assuming it has any). The main plot seems to be about three women and three men who are so bored with existence that they can't seem to derive happiness out of anything, and spend most of their time attempting to derive happiness out of the sexual pleasures of other people. Jerry (Ben Stiller) is with Terri (Catherine Keener). Jerry decides he'd like a fling with Mary (Amy Brenneman), who's with Barry (Aaron Eckhart. A chubby, pre-DARK KNIGHT Aaron Eckhart. Not that there was anything wrong with his performance. I just wonder why he was so chubby then, as opposed to now). Terri wants a fling with Cheri (Nastassja Kinski). Cary (Jason Patric) doesn't seem to want anything with anybody, including the human race itself, while Barry is apparently getting more out of his right hand than he is any sexual partner.It's funny that when you write it out like this, you can see why this would make a funny movie. So I have to wonder why it didn't make me laugh.Did I miss something? Sex is the primary motivator here, there's no mention of love anywhere, from anybody. There's a plot device of the question of who the men have had the best sex with, Barry's answer being his hand and Cary's answer being downright terrifying (his male rape victim in high school, for the record. I don't know why that's funny, or even if it's SUPPOSED to be funny). I can't remember Jerry's answer. Must not have been that interesting. Maybe he said something dumb, like "Terri, of course!" I don't know. I don't think it matters.There is a question that comes up, for people like this, that's never answered in the film: How did these people meet? WHY did they meet, and then WHY did they end up in bed together, pretending to have relationships where there is no evidence of any kind that they are even CAPABLE of them? But, I digress.The resolving plot device on the other side of this mess of bed-jumping, Cary's theatrical flipping out about unsatisfying women and berating Terri, and jokes about how having sex with a woman is better than having sex with Ben Stiller (a decent argument, maybe) leaves all of them more miserable when they came in (even Barry, though I honestly can't figure out WHY. He started this tale loving his hand, and ends it that way. I guess maybe he needs more in life? Who would've guessed??). Despite their need to change partners, Jerry begs to go back to Terri, Cheri wants Terri to actually talk to her (something Terri refuses to do, because I guess sex is all she's looking for?) Barry talks to a phone for sex and ends up disappointed for some reason, and Mary and Cary end this visage of shallowness with the question that's dominated the dissolution of these strange intermingle-ings. "Maybe it's me," they all ask, except Cary, who appears at the very end to play with Amy Brenneman's breasts.Strangely enough it's Barry who wins for being the only character I seemed to care about. I remember him as being a nice enough guy, and the part of him loving his own hand is more of a practical answer to a question answered in a boy's locker room rather than a joke. I guess his loneliness at the end is supposed to mean something, like he's supposed to be with somebody, but he's the only character that never really goes bed-hopping (besides the insane Cary), so I fail to understand the point of what I see.I really think that Cary, a doctor who despises people, threatens people, demeans and berates people, is supposed to be the main article of comedy here, because his acting is by far the most theatrical. The only trouble is, he's only amusing in that way a friend of yours jokes about taking a rifle to the top of a clock tower—it's only funny as long as he doesn't MEAN IT.Cary means it. And illustrates it. He is not well with the world.I don't get this movie. It's hard for me to care for anybody, impossible for me to laugh at anything, and when it's all said and done, a bunch of shallow people ponder their existence by wondering if their daily choices of doing everything simply out of interest for themselves could be the cause of their misery. And since that sums up the film, let me spare you the trouble of watching it by answering their question for them: YES, IT IS.
Seltzer
Bad acting, bad writing, bad lighting, bad camera work, and lots of fake humping moments. Ugh! I think this is, perhaps, the worst film I've ever seen and that's saying a lot considering that I am a big Roddy McDowall fan which means that I have sat through a lot of schlock in my time waiting him to show up in the many, many bad movies he made during his later career. I wish McDowall had been in this film, at least I would have some excuse for having sat through it besides the fact that the dog was snoozing on my arm so I didn't like to disturb him by searching in the cushions of the couch for the remote control. Can you tell that I'm just typing away trying to get to the 10, (wait, spell it out, that's more characters) ten required lines for an IMDb review when I really said all I had to say about this film in the first two sentences of this review?
itamarscomix
There are just so many films just like this, that I can't really say much for Your Friends & Neighbors, mainly because it offers very little to make in memorable or distinguishable in any way. A group of people in their 30's spend the film talking about their unsatisfying relationships and sex lives and cheating on each other with each other; it has all the markings of a 90's theater play, and everything it takes to be an indie darling, including a cast of some of the more popular indie-film stars of the time (this at a time when Ben Stiller was still known more for Reality Bites than for comedies like Zoolander). The acting is indeed good - Jason Patric and Catherine Keener especially, and the film does have a few good scenes, wittily written and well delivered. But in the end, the characters are all completely unlikable and forgettable - they're all characterized solely by their insecurities, shallowness, selfishness, delusions and sexual quirks, and there's nothing there to make the viewer care at all about any of them or about anything that happens to them - and not much happens, at that. The film is the very definition of mediocrity and forgettability.
littlebrownmanfrommars
Neil Labute look at relationships is as sharp and as poignant as it ever has been but it lacks the emotional punch and the ferocity of his first effort' In The Company of Men, and his latest' The Shape of Things'. None of the characters in this film is innocent, and they are to be quite honest not that interesting except for Jason Patric, who is playing the character who likes to put all things about the sexes in misogynistic perspective. Catherine Keener, and the great Aaron Eckhart are fine as well but the movie on the whole is not really interesting enough to make you invest your time with them. See In The Company of Men, and The Shape of Things instead.
