LADIES NIGHT: a review of "Bridesmaids"

“BRIDESMAIDS”
A Judd Apatow Production
Written by Annie Mumolo & Kristin Wiig
Directed by Paul Feig
**** (four stars)

Now this is how you get the job done!!

“Bridesmaids,” the latest movie from filmmaker Judd Apatow’s creative compound is a grand slam! Not only does the film feature the creative reunion between Apatow and Director Paul Feig, who previously collaborated on the brilliant and disappointingly short lived television series “Freaks and Geeks,” it is also a creative and comedic triumph for “Saturday Night Live” cast member Kristin Wiig. In addition to co-writing the screenplay, Wiig delivers a top notch, multi-layered, hysterical and heartbreaking performance that never strikes even one false note. She is in such command of her gifts, so empathetic and honest that the richness of her work deserves to be remembered during awards season. Yes, dear readers, I said it…awards season! The film is indeed this good and Kristin Wiig is a force to be reckoned with.

For all of the talk and advertisements that suggest “Bridesmaids” is essentially a female version of “The Hangover” (2009) is to give this film short shrift as it firmly stands upon its own cinematic feet. “Bridesmaids” bests “The Hangover” and most modern day comedy films hands down, and in fact, it puts them all to shame. It goes the extra mile through the seemingly simple act and artistry of devoting its time and energy to developing strong storytelling and realistic characters without even one wacky romantic comedy plot in sight. When Apatow is on his game, he and his troupe are unstoppable and “Bridesmaids” confidently sails to the heights of his prolific production crop.

Kristin Wiig stars as Annie Walker, a Milwaukee, WI woman in early middle age caught within a downturn in the trajectory of her life. Once the owner of a bakery called “Cake Baby,” now closed due to the economic recession, Annie now petulantly works behind the counter at a jewelry store selling engagement rings to happy couples and “Best Friends Forever” necklaces to snotty high school girls. Her car is essentially on life support, she shares an apartment with a bizarre, sideshow ready British brother and sister and engages in occasional aggressively acrobatic yet empty sexual trysts with the wealthy, uncaring and obnoxiously vein Ted (Jon Hamm).

The one element in her life, at this stage, that elicits any happiness is her lifelong friendship with Lillian Donovan (Maya Rudolph). The day after yet another miserable night with Ted, Annie and Lillian swap stories and share the very laughs that have built and sustained their friendship since childhood. Soon thereafter, Annie receives an emotional shock as Lillian has become engaged to longtime boyfriend Doug (Tim Heidecker). Of course, Lillian strongly desires Annie to be her Maid Of Honor, a role to which Annie agrees despite her fears that this event will be the beginning of the end of their friendship.

As wedding preparations begin to mount, Annie meets the remainder of Lillian’s bridal party, which includes: Rita (Wendi McLendon-Covey), a sharp-tongued woman who detests her marriage and children; Becca (Ellie Kemper), a chirpy newlywed who pities Annie’s single status; Megan (Melissa McCarthy), a forthright, blunt and sexually adventurous woman who is also Doug’s sister; and Helen Harris (Rose Byrne), the gorgeous, wealthy and unctuous trophy wife of Doug’s boss and Annie’s soon to be arch nemesis for the grand prize: Lillian’s “best” friendship.

While all of Lillian’s pre-wedding events disastrously fall apart due to Helen’s covert one-upmanship, nearly every element of Annie’s life implodes due to her mounting insecurities. But maybe one aspect of her life is beginning to look up as Annie gradually begins to form a romance with Officer Nathan Rhodes (a charming Chris O’Dowd), the Irish State Trooper who pulled her over for a broken taillight on her journeys between Wisconsin and the uber wealthy land of northern Illinois.

Despite the fact that true love with the kindly trooper looms, Annie is consumed with the painful realization that life is rapidly passing her by, and worst of all, the potential of losing Lillian to her new emotionally (and financially) stable life forever.

As with the majority of Judd Apatow’s productions and his own directorial efforts, “Bridesmaids” is a cheerfully vulgar and raucous experience filled to the brim with salty language and outrageous sequences-including one already infamous section involving the unfortunate mash-up of a bridal fitting with food poisoning. But, as with the very best of Apatow’s productions and his directorial efforts, “Bridesmaids” has so much more on its mind than four letter words, gross-out jokes and shallowly proving that women can throw down just as effectively as men in the adult R rated comedy genre. “Bridesmaids” has a true story to tell, with richly developed, three-dimensional characters that builds into a hugely warm experience that was surprisingly (and deeply) moving.

Judd Apatow has received much criticism that his films tend to run about 15-30 minutes too long. But as the late great Gene Siskel and the still great Roger Ebert have expressed time and again, no good movie is too long and no bad movie is too short. Truth be told, I have seen more than my share of 90-minute films that feel three times as long while “Bridesmaids,” which has a running time of two hours and five minutes, was a film I could have easily viewed even another hour. The film left me with the same feeling I had at the conclusion of Apatow’s “Knocked Up” (2007), as I had loved that film’s collective of characters so much. I loved listening to them talk. I loved seeing their lives and how they viewed themselves and the world in which they lived and I was sad to see the end credits begin to scroll as I just wanted even more.

“Bridesmaids” is a film that deeply loves its characters and it works diligently to weave a tapestry that ensures an audience would love to spend time with these women just as much as the filmmakers did. I appreciate how Apatow encourages collaboration, all the way to supporting his actors to write for themselves, just as Jason Segal performed with his excellent screenplay for Nicholas Stoller’s “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” (2008). I also greatly appreciate how Apatow, Feig, Wiig and the remainder of the cast and crew understand that comedy is not always about the jokes and how comedy is greatly informed by the characters and how well we know and relate to those characters. I especially loved how Feig allowed his scenes to play at length, a tactic which allowed the social discomforts to stretch to their limits. What begins politely delves into awkwardness, slides into muttered and subtle acts of passive-aggressiveness and then explodes into excruciating hilarity.

For all of the talk that aforementioned food poisoning sequence is going to receive, for me, the film’s tour de force is the extended section where Lillian and her bridesmaids are all travelling to Las Vegas…with Annie in Coach while everyone else rides in First Class. The sequence not only extends the rivalry between Annie and Helen, which in turn increases Lillian’s discomfort. It gives time to the other women in the bridal party to strut their stuff, broadening and deepening their characters in the process.

And how about the women! The characters of “Bridesmaids” all feel authentic. They say and do and feel the very things that women say and do and feel in the real world. They all even look like real women and not like the glossy, prefabricated and so-called “Real Housewives” of reality television. These characters do not exist as plastic sitcom characters either as their motivations are grounded in reality, a trait that makes them all relatable-a quality that I would not have to mention if it were not such a rarity. Even Melissa McCarthy, who emerges as the ROCK STAR of this film, has moments of pure depth and darkness that feels real and transcends what could have been a part designed to show her off as the “funny fat girl.”

While it is a progression for Apatow to finally oversee a film that is driven by women, especially in a genre that is historically male driven, it should not really come as much of a surprise as his female characters typically are not relegated to the sidelines in his work. The women from his television series and films are always integral to the plot. In fact, the male characters of his productions and films are clearly defined by the women they choose to love, to date, to have children with and to marry. The men are defined by the very women they are infatuated with, mystified by and terrified of. I loved how “Bridesmaids” leapt over every cliché of the romantic comedy genre which typically creates films with despicable female characters like the ones found in “The Proposal” (2009) or even Director P.J. Hogan’s 1997 smash hit “My Best Friend’s Wedding” (which I loathed). While Annie and Helen are spiteful and horrible to each other, the women in “Bridesmaids” are not fighting over a man. They are fighting over a friend, being relevant to someone else’s life and increasing their own shaky sense of self-worth.

Annie Walker is a leading character to sympathize with and understand even when the film is highly critical of her behavior. She is no saint but we want for her to succeed simply because we are so in tune with her sense of disappointment, her fears of being left behind, left out and ultimately forgotten by the one person who means the most to her. Kristin Wiig’s performance is pitch perfect and it injects the film with a proper amount of profound melancholy, especially in a short scene where she allows herself to bake cupcakes, even though it is a blatant reminder of the life she once fought for and was taken away. Annie Walker is not only fighting to retain her best friend. She is fighting the future itself. She is fighting the forced change that hits all of us, whether we want it to or not and within her terrified resistance, lies the enormous comedy that allows the audience to laugh instead of become a puddle of tears. It is a true balancing act that succeeds and through her wonderful performance and clear-eyed writing, we are able to see that “Bridesmaids” is a love story. It is a love story to female friendships and discovering a sense of perseverance when all obstacles are stacked against you.

At its core, “Bridesmaids” is a film about failure, envy, jealousy, competition, self-loathing, insecurity, class warfare, the clash of the person you once were and the person you are becoming and how it relates to another’s personal evolution. It is about how a Wilson Phillips song two friends once shared is more meaningful in middle age than it was during adolescence. It is a film about the tenuous nature of friendship and the struggle of how we remain friends as we age. And to think, we can get all of this plus have the comedy that is legitimately and riotously funny.

Two years ago in my reviews of “The Hangover,” I wrote the following:

“Here’s an idea. Let’s shake up the genre. Get Rachael Harris, Leslie Mann, Amy Poehler and Kristin Wiig together. Get Tina Fey to write it with her trademark savage humor. I would love to see what they could do with that kind of a hangover.”

Judd Apatow, Paul Feig and the marvelous Kristin Wiig have more than shaken up the genre. They have raised the bar.

“Bridesmaids” is one of my favorite films of 2011.