The Five-Year
Engagement - (April 27th, 2012): R
Distributor: Universal
Pictures
Opening Weekend Box Office:
$11,157,000
Domestic Box Office
Gross to-date: $11,157,000
Gross Revenue: $11,157,000
Production Budget:
$30 million
Director: Nick Stoller
When I reviewed The Muppets back in November, I
elaborated on Jason Segel’s growing popularity, thanks largely to his
mass-market appeal work on How I Met Your
Mother, but I am sure that a number of his fans were glad to see him return
to his roots with Judd Apatow, whom he partnered with on Freaks and Geeks, Knocked Up,
and Forgetting Sarah Marshall. While this reunion was perhaps the biggest
selling-point for The Five-Year
Engagement, the inclusion of the always-gorgeous Emily Blunt was sure to
generate interest out of sheer curiosity…she may have worked with Segel in Gulliver’s Travels and appeared in The Muppets, but she certainly wasn’t
top-of-mind in terms of comedic actresses.
Still, leading up to its release, promotions featuring these two
frustrated future newlyweds were absolutely everywhere, from bus posters to
billboards, while trailers featured the offbeat premise that seemed primed to
deliver big laughs. One fact that could
either function as a positive or negative for The Five-Year Engagement’s performance was the obvious and justified
comparison to Bridesmaids (in regards
to both subject matter and release schedule)…the association would probably
sell tickets, but it could also skew quality expectations a little too strongly,
thereby opening up the possibility of Bridesmaids’
purists unfairly dampening word of mouth if the same level of pleasant surprise
from last summer wasn’t achieved again. I
was already pretty-much set to see the film, but once I heard supporting
actress Alison Brie talk about the film with Kevin & Bean on KROQ and
preview a few sound bites, I was absolutely sold; and though it doesn’t
technically count as a summer film, I was fully-expecting the comedy to help
set the pace for the ridiculously-stacked Summer Movie Season.
The
Five-Year Engagement opens in San Francisco with high-profile sous chef Tom
Solomon (Jason Segel) proposing to his girlfriend, psychology doctoral student
Violet Barnes (Emily Blunt), who happily accepts. Though they begin planning their nuptials
almost immediately, Tom and Violet’s plans are sidetracked when Tom’s friend
and co-worker, Alex (Chris Pratt), gets Violet’s sister, Suzie (Alison Brie),
pregnant at the engagement party; and the two polar opposites decide to get
married before Tom and Violet. Things
get further complicated when Violet is accepted into a post-doctoral program at
The University of Michigan, which requires the couple to relocate and delay the
wedding for at least two years. While
Violet is thriving in her new job under the direction of noted psychology
professor Winton Childs (Rhys Ifans), Tom is clearly unhappy, having been
forced into accepting an unsuitable job at a college-town deli and finding no
way to fill the leisure hours, aside from hunting. When Violet’s program is extended, Tom
becomes increasingly disillusioned and the once-perfect relationship begins to
suffer, begging the question as to whether the two betrothed will ever find the
desired conditions and circumstances for their desired wedding.
As I mentioned in the “Short and
Sweet” review, easily the best part of The
Five-Year Engagement is the remarkable chemistry between the cast, which
not only adds to the humor levels, but also imbues the narrative with considerable
emotion and intelligence. While there
are dozens of films that I can point out where the pairing between the romantic
leads is clearly forced, such is not the case in this romantic comedy, as Jason
Segel and Emily Blunt present a very natural and believable couple who are as
funny as they are sweet, so much so that you find yourself hoping that the
romance between these two continues off-screen.
And then there is the supporting cast, which actually represents a far
stronger comedic ensemble than any of the trailers would have led you to
believe; Chris Pratt and Alison Brie are enjoyable are the future Best Man and
Maid of Honor, but the real treats are found in Kevin Hart and Mindy Kaling as
members of Violet’s research team, or in Brian Posehn and Chris Parnell as Tom’s
decidedly off-beat co-workers. Now,
having all of these familiar faces together doesn’t mean a thing if none of the
jokes work, but rest-assured, there are plenty of hysterical scenarios and
clever lines to keep a smile on your face throughout the running time…the Sesame Street conversation between Emily
Blunt and Alison Brie is one of funniest/most creative dialogues I have heard
in quite some time. Unfortunately, for
as enjoyable as I found The Five-Year
Engagement, I do have to acknowledge that there are some pretty gaping
shortcomings once you look beyond the inherent likability of the cast.
Don’t get me wrong, The Five-Year Engagement will definitely
get audiences laughing and does achieve a respectable balance between humor and
pathos, but unfortunately, it takes the film a little too much time and effort
to achieve these accolades. For those
with short attention spans, be warned that the laughs are far from
instantaneous, and there a number of jokes that the cast tries far too hard to
get off the ground, making groan-inducing and corny what was intended to be
side-splitting and impactful…I’m sure the cast had fun filming those scenes,
but I doubt that the audience will have as much fun watching those same scenes. In terms of the story itself, the conflicts
that prevent the couple from tying the knot just don’t seem to justify delays,
giving the overall message very little emotional impact by the time the ending
credits roll; after about the fifth rescheduling, I found myself asking: “Why
again haven’t they got married?” And,
speaking of the build-up to the end-credits, the film is noticeably too long; The Five-Year Engagement is not a bad
film that drags on, it is just that the novelty of the concept wears off rather
quickly and offers no true surprises or pay-offs for the investment required of
the audience. So, while these
shortcomings don’t exactly sink the film, they do prevent this newest Judd
Apatow project from reaching the same level of quality that has come to be
expected, given his previous work.
Judging on the pre-release trailers,
I fully expected The Five-Year Engagement
to take the top spot in its opening weekend, even if it was facing last weekend’s
strong performer, Think Like a Man;
however, as I sat and actually watched the film, I noticed a marketing misstep
that I thought could end up becoming a costly mistake. When you consider that the romantic comedy
opened at a decidedly disappointing fifth place with just over $11 million
against a $30 million production budget, something clearly went wrong. To me, the biggest mistake was that the promotional
material underestimated the star-power of the supporting cast, a majority of
whom I had no idea would actually appear…you may be aiming for a surprised
reaction out of your audience, but you have just sacrificed the celebrity
familiarity that could have been used to build that audience in the first
place. It is certainly ironic that Kevin
Hart, the runaway star of the now-two-week box office champion (Screen Gem’s Think Like a Man), actually has a role
in The Five-Year Engagement, but his
presence in the film wasn’t leveraged in anyway whatsoever to obtain some share
of Screen Gem’s audience; if Universal wants to give its romantic comedy legs
facing the juggernauts of the Summer Movie Season, that association and the identification
of the other names in the film need to take place immediately in post-release
trailers. Bottom line, marketing may
have underplayed some of the appeal of The
Five-Year Engagement, but that
shouldn’t stop you from seeing this enjoyable, if slightly flawed, romantic
comedy.
