There are some films that are just hard to market. This can be for many reasons. One, it could be a story that is difficult to convey its intricacies within a two minute time span. Or it could be there's a few reveals halfway through the film that the trailers don't necessarily want to spoil. Or it could be a movie that's so twisty and turn-y that to give any part of the story away is to ruin the story. I remember seeing the trailer for Gone Girl and thinking I knew what it was about and getting halfway through the movie and realizing it was NOTHING like what I was thinking. However, Gone Girl had the clout of the novel backing it up, so the trailer actually didn't have to show that much. A Simple Favor, on the other had, does have a novel the movie is based on, but it isn't Gone Girl big enough to let the book speak for the movie. As far as marketing the film - there's just no way to be able to convey both the plot and the tone of the movie in two plus minutes. So, it's actually pretty amazing that the movie hasn't tanked from the very start. Sure, they were able to tease something sinister in the trailer. And sure, Anna Kendrick is a box office draw. But an R-rated thriller (?) no one knows much about is a tough sell and I appreciate what it's been able to do...
I'm just not sure if it was done right. And, unfortunately, I'm going to have keep you on the hook as well with just what the hell it is you're going to be watching in this film. I don't want to give anything away because the mystery will be spoiled. But I also want you to be able to make your own decision if you want to spend your hard earned dollars (or one of your three MoviePass trips) to see this movie. So, I'll put it like this - A Simple Favor is Gone Girl-esque. Anna Kendrick is the bubbly Stephanie, a go-getter mom who volunteers for everything at her kid's school, and loves the fact that "being a mom is a full time job". She's a mommy vlogger, filming herself showing mothers how to do various arts and crafts and how to cook her favorite gluten-free recipes. Her son befriends the son of Emily (Blake Lively), an affluent, terrifying, beautiful mother all of the other parents fear. When Stephanie brings her son over for a play-date, Emily and her share a cocktail and begin a very strange friendship that you will continuously question the validity of. A few weeks later, after Stephanie and Emily have become "best friends" even though their personalities completely clash, Emily asks Stephanie for a simple favor - just pick up her son and watch him for the night while she's gone for a work function. Stephanie complies, but Emily never shows up. In fact, Emily goes missing entirely. When the police aren't much help, Stephanie takes it upon herself to try and unravel the mystery (and there is much to unravel) of where her best friend is... and just WHO her best friend is.
That's it! That's all you get to know. I might've already said too much. But suffice it to say that everything in the movie is not exactly what it seems on the surface - otherwise there wouldn't be a movie. The problem the movie has going for it is how I described it earlier. It IS Gone Girl-esque, but that's not necessarily something that helps it out. Because Gone Girl was such a hit and such a shock in the twist department, A Simple Favor seems to pale in comparison. It comes off as Gone Girl lite, when it really should be a movie that stands on its own. There are a lot of differences in the film, both in plot and overall tone, but because it deals with a rich, missing wife whose life wasn't exactly what she claimed it is - it's going to draw those parallels. And because the twists and turns and shocks in A Simple Favor aren't nearly as clever as in Gone Girl, the movie does seem to be lacking. Had it come out a year before... it would've been hailed as brilliant. But it was just a little bit too late.
Director Paul Feig is a strange choice for a movie like this. On the one hand, he's one of the few directors right now giving a yearly platform for actresses to be able to have starring vehicles with great writing attached. But, dipping his toe into the mystery/thriller genre was kind of a stretch. He's known for his female-driven comedies (Bridesmaids, The Heat, Spy, Ghostbusters), and what he's done with A Simple Favor is sort of mesh his comedic style with that of a midnight mystery novel. Anna Kendrick's bubbly/goofy mom-persona would've been a perfect quirky character in a Feig straight up comedy. Here... she's still great, but when shit hits the fan and it's time for this quirky character to show some emotional range, it does feel a little bit jarring. When she enacts certain "plans" to uncover certain truths, it feels almost out of character for her. But, on the other hand, where Gone Girl was the dark and quiet and brooding and almost nauseating-feeling movie... A Simple Favor is played like a dark comedy. There are a lot of laughs in this movie. For example, other than the fact that Emily is a very intimidating woman, the interactions she and Stephanie have are quite amusing. You feel like Emily could snap off the rails at any second, but she's also curious about what makes a woman like Stephanie just so incessantly happy, which gives the two of them great chemistry and a lot of humorous moments together. I like looking at the movie as if it was Gone Girl with a darkly comedic twist - because it kind of is - but it's still a very jarring feeling watching the movie.
The reveals are, in some aspects, satisfying, and in other aspects, obvious. Unlike Gone Girl, I wasn't totally shocked each time something new about the main characters were revealed. There were a few that I thought were pretty clever, but others that I could see coming a mile away - and you will also. There's also a few more plot holes in this movie that added to the messiness of the story that you'll be able to feel throughout. It's messy because of its constant shifts in tone, but it's also messy because there's so much info being thrown at you and not all of it is meaningful. Stuff that seems to be thrown in to fool the audience that never comes back actually sends the viewer down a rabbit (plot) hole of trying to fill in the gaps in logic.
It's not a bad movie by any means, but I can't say it's the greatest either when something similar has come out before it and done it better. I want to be able to separate the movies, but most moviegoers aren't going to be able to help draw the comparisons and when that happens, A Simple Favor just can't hold a candle to Gone Girl. I love and seriously appreciate what Paul Feig has done with the source material available to him, but it's just not the great dark comedy/mystery I thought it was going to be. The actors in the film are all top notch (Kenrick is wonderful, and Lively is scary as hell - in a good way), it's got a sleek look, a decent amount of comedy, and a mystery that will keep viewers interested the entire time - I'm just not sure if, by the end, it will be satisfying enough.
C+
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