FRIENDS WITH KIDS - The Scene That Made It All Worth It

Sometimes the concept can get in the way of the story.

'Friends with Kids' has a concept that it struggles to handle. The concept is: Two friends, who have no attraction to each other but have never found the 'right one', decide to have a baby together (because they both want kids). They share the responsibility, and they are both free to go on dating and living their lives, without having a depressing marriage that's ruined by kids -- like all of their friends.

Having a good concept is important, and this one is intriguing. But Jennifer Westfeldt (the writer, director and star) has a hard time taking us there.

Let me skip ahead and say: some of this film is fantastic. The latter end of the film really resonates and has a lot of truths about life, and it's acted and directed wonderfully.

But it takes a huge leap of faith to get there, because the first half of the movie is trying to sell the concept to us. It's played out like a quirky rom-com, where the two main characters help each other with their dating and sex lives, while always being a little bit above their friends by staying a little detached.

BUT WE KNOW THEY'RE GOING TO END UP TOGETHER!

Of course, we always know that in these types of films. But you gotta give us a reason why they might NOT end up together, they need some road blocks in the way. Julie (Jennifer Westfeldt) and Jason (Adam Scott) have a child together, they care deeply about each other, they're best friends and they're beautiful people --- we know where it's headed, no surprises. So when they then they go out dating-- they're fooling no-one, apart from theirselves. But it's really hard for the audience to buy that!

But the film gets great.

Julie meets a great guy, Kurt (Ed Burns), and Jason begins dating an actress, Mary Jane (Megan Fox). Meanwhile, they have a kid to raise. What makes it interesting is the layers, the complexities. Kurt is a normal guy, who struggles to grasp their set-up. Mary Jane is a young sexy actress, and Jason's wiping baby shit off his clothes. Suddenly -- the dynamic feels real, it feels honest. It takes half of the movie for the concept to actually work.

The golden scene is the dinner scene.

Jason and Julie were always judgemental of their friends and their lifestyles -- they had a problem with how ordinary and dysfunctional they were. But now their relationships are struggling, and they're trying to bring a child up in this mad way. It all comes to a head at dinner - when every relationship at the table implodes.

Everyone is unhappy. Everyone has resentments. Suddenly this feels like life!

It's handled beautifully. Kristen Wiig puts the comedy aside and takes us to the heart of matters. And Jon Hamm is so good and so harsh that he's PAINFUL to watch. The characters are protecting each other one moment, and then ruining each other the next. The complexity is riveting.

There are ghosts in the room. Ghosts of all the things they've never said to each other. You ever had that? A group of friends, or family, and the conflict is simply this: no-one says what they really feel! I remember a few years back I was going through a really difficult time with one of my best friends, because we just didn't grasp each other. I saw him as this guy who got old before his time, caring about wallpaper and a mortgage rather than life! And he saw me as this wishy washy film kid who was sitting at home all day watching movies. We were both wrong! But we only realised this when we talked about it. There's always more to the story.

The real ghost in the room is the love between Julia and Jason. Luckily, by now it is REAL and COMPLEX, and the quirky bullshit rom-com of the first quarter of the film has literally vanished, and it's all the better for it.

Whoever you are, you'll see yourself in this room. Are you Kurt (Ed Burns), the practical guy who is trying to figure out the nuts and bolts of the arrangement? Are you Ben (Jon Hamm) who thinks they're irresponsible? Are you Leslie (Maya Rudolph) who's trying to brush over everything and pretend there's no problem? Or are you the nice guy, Alex (Chris O'Dowd), who's not really strong enough to get involved and have an opinion?

And then the ghost gets addressed.

It starts with Ben challenging them:

BEN 

Seriously, you guys didn't think ANY of this through. You made a totally irresponsible decision, about a kid! And yeah Joe is fine, now, he's 1. But you really think he's going to be okay when he finds out his parents never loved him, even when they had him? 

Jason gets defensive, he challenges them about their own kid.

JASON 

You really think Troy's doing great around two people who fucking hate each other? 

They're attacking each other, they're fighting, and you can't take your eyes of it. But the bickering and shouting and judgements are futile. And then it happens.

JASON

You think that I haven't thought this through? You think that we don't love each other? I have loved this girl for 19 years, Ben. That is fully half my life. I know everything there is to know about her. I know the mood she's in when she wakes up in the morning. Always happy, ready for the day, can you imagine? I know that she is honest, she won't even take the little shampoo bottles from the hotel room, or sneak into the movie theater for a double feature, she always buys a second ticket-- always. I know that we have the same values. We have the same tastes, we have the same sense of humour. I know that we both think that organised religion is completely full of shit. I know that if she is ever paralysed from the neck down she would like me to unplug her, and I will. I know her position on just about everything, and I am on board. I am on board with everything about her. So you tell me Ben, what better woman could I have picked to be the Mother of my child, seriously? What more responsible choice could I have made? Fucking Prick. 

There's more to the scene. I don't want to spoil everything. It's that complexity and honesty, not just between the lead characters but the whole ensemble, that makes everything suddenly fascinating. Ultimately, that is what makes Jennifer Westfeldt's work interesting: the honesty. It was the same with 'Kissing Jessica Stein', a film about a straight woman who suddenly finds an interest in a another woman. The concept wasn't a clever as it thought it was, but the honest moments still found their way through.

Maybe this is what Jennifer needs to do to get funding, to do films independently of the studios. Has to cook up an 'out there' concept. Ultimately, 'Friends with Kids' repeatedly struggles with its concept. Yet within it, there are some hugely brilliant moments in it that capture who we are as adults, parents, and people who don't want to get old. 

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KRISTEN WIIG in 'BRIDESMAIDS' - The WRITING and ACTING of 'ANNIE WALKER'

There was a lot of hype about 'Bridesmaids' when it came out. Article after article about how it was going to change the industry. But just because a few black men are in politics now, it doesn't mean hundreds of years of institutional racism vanish. Likewise, the fact that a few male producers enabled two women to write a movie and have a female cast; it doesn't mean it's suddenly an even playing field.

But I wish it was. Because women are great at making movies. They're great when they step out of the restrictive chick-flick genre; because when films like 'Sex & The City' get made, I'd rather keep male privilege rolling for another hundred years. But films like 'Bridesmaids' and 'Whip It' - to give two examples (albeit light-comedy examples) show that there is a whole voice missing from cinema, a whole gender's perspective to be truly explored. The history of cinema is, by and large, the history of male storytelling.

In June 2009 I wrote a blog called 'Men Only' in which I said, among other things, "I love women on screen, they're an important part of films; but it's very rare that I find them interesting enough to carry a film as the lead. What's that about?"

And I want you to know I fully retract everything I said in that article. I was wrong, and my views have changed considerably.

A perfect example of great acting is Kristen Wiig in 'Bridesmaids'.



When you're watching a comedy, you rarely think about its complexity. You just have a good time and wait for the next laugh to come. Wiig's character, Annie Walker, was amazingly written and acted; a stunning performance from the lead actress. Not only is it worth noting -- I think it's worth exploring further.

Annie Walker was vulnerable and fragile throughout the whole film. At the beginning we find out that her business attempt, opening a bakery during the recession, has failed. When it did, her boyfriend left. Her best friend is getting married and her love life consists of casual sex with a man who doesn't listen to her, doesn't care about her needs, and doesn't want her sticking around for the night.

You cling on to anything when you're down. Annie clings on to her best friend, Lillian (Maya Rudolph) who is also getting married. There's a touching scene when Lillian announces she's getting married and asks Annie to be the bridesmaid. Of course, she says yes -- but only seconds later, as Lillian chats on the phone to her fiance we see Annie sitting there trying to hide her loneliness.

The supporting characters in a film all give us information about the main character. It's done to maximum effect in this film when the gorgeous, rich, youthful and seemingly perfect Helen immediately makes Annie feel bad about herself. With just a look in her eyes we can see she feels old and under threat. We can all relate to it. We've all had a friend bring along a new friend and we feel all threatened and insecure about their in-jokes.

Wiig is noted for her comedic talents, which are undeniable. But the core of this movie is actually carried by her dramatic abilities. Those moments in between the laughs -- little snapshots of her character that lived outside of the writing.

A great example is the scene where she makes a cupcake in her apartment. She takes the time to make a perfect cake, which she bakes and decorates to perfection. She places it carefully on the table, on its own ---- before picking it up and scoffing it down herself. What a great, unique way to show loneliness! Lesser writers would have had her calling someone up and saying 'I'm lonely' or listening to 'All By Myself' -- here we just have her eating a cupcake, and it tells us everything.

I can't think of any other character in recent film history who shows the anxiety of insecurity and fear as well as Annie Walker does here. The writers really kept hitting this home, scene after scene. The airplane scene, renowned for her hilarious drunkenness and for Megan's (Melissa McCarthey's) conversation with the Air Marshall; also carries a lot of dramatic weight in that in cements the gap that is increasing between Annie and her best friend, which is being made worse by the fact Lillian and Helen are getting closer and closer as friends (due to her failings). They are in first class, while she is stuck in coach.

After Annie's mad, drunken behavior on the plane; Lillian suggests that maybe being the Bridesmaid is too much for her. Of course; this is the thing she'd always feared. Of not being enough, of not being able to do a good job, of not being able to be a great friend. That's what insecurity does, renders you ineffective and makes your worst fears come true. It's that vulnerability that Wiig manages to portray so truthfully. 

The sadness of the character is what makes it so compelling. It's what grips you. The funny situations she gets in have a weight to them because they're rooted in realism, no matter how absurd they are. We can relate. I can relate, and I'm a man. That's why all this men-only-in-leading-roles is bullshit, because we're all human beings, and our problems are universal.

The writing takes a great turn in that she begins to get what she needs: a good man (Chris O'Dowd as Officer Nathan Rhodes). Yet she runs from it. Can't handle it. Things have been going wrong for so long, what the hell do you do when something right comes along? There's a simple scene afterwards when she phones Lillian and says she doesn't have a clue what she's doing, it's the most truthful moment of the movie. Truthful because, in life, so often we don't know what we're doing. 

After all this -- she's lost. Lost her center, the thing that makes her herself. She loses her job in the jewelry store after calling a customer a cu*t, she's ignoring Nathan (without really knowing why), and she's asked to move out by her English roommates. What makes it so satisfying, dramatically, is that we feel for her -- she's a good woman, doing her best; yet again and again she's failing. We can all relate to it because that's how the world works.

Comedy is better when you relate to it, when it has reality as a basis. Or not even as a basis, it just needs something in there that's authentic. That's why 'The Other Guys' sucked. Absurd is fine, but you need a center; a place to jump off from. 'Bridesmaids' took care of these details and that's why it's superior to most of the comedies of recent years.

Then there's the bridal shower, which she's invited to despite being demoted from her Bridesmaid duties. She's a good friend and a proud person, so she makes sure she's there. She loves her friend. We see this when she gives her a present, a touchingly personal gift -- a collection of things from back home in Milwaukee, along with a photo montage from their younger days.

And then rich-and-perfect Helen buys Lillian a trip to Paris; an idea which stemmed from a conversation with Annie about how much Lillian likes Paris. Annie is heartbroken -- it's an extremely bitchy and manipulative move from Helen; which we the audience can see, and our hero Annie can see -- but the guests at the party can't. 

What follows is Annie going absolutely crazy; wrecking the garden and smashing things to pieces. It's a hilarious yet cringeworthy scene; but powerful because we feel her sense of injustice. Yet dramatically, she's ruining her best friend's wedding experience. The complex blend of comedy, sadness, and the righteousness of the other characters is brilliantly handled.




The Writing of the film, by Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo, with the watchful eye of Judd Apatow; is the core of what makes this film great. Each event, each scene, drives Annie further and further away from her best friend, and from herself. It's rooted in truth; we can relate to what's happening because we'd want to react just like she does. Even the parts of the film that are over the top and ridiculous, we're still there-- because the characters are so true. 


It's the acting of the film that brings it home. The best actors are able to do two opposite things on screen. It's why people pay Robert Downey Jr so much money, and it's why we all loved Jack Lemmon. Kristen Wiig has a touch of that magic. She knows how to get the laugh -- years at the Groundlings Theatre, and live SNL performances, and the multitude of ridiculous jobs before she 'made it' have helped shape the comedic talent that she is. What makes her performance in 'Bridesmaids' stand out, is how layered it is. We laugh at the comedy, but it's the heart and honesty we connect with. 

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KRISTEN WIIG In BRIDESMAIDS

Believe the hype. The film is great.

Kristen Wiig steals the show. It is her show. She deserves it. Undeniably one of the most talented actresses and naturally gifted comedians in the business; this film showcases everything about her that is awesome.

And she's not just funny. She pulls at your heart in this movie. There are times when she communicates giant pangs of loneliness or intense and heartbreaking vulnerability -- and she's able to do it with just a look. A moment.

That's what great acting is, capturing a moment. The best actors can do it in a millisecond by doing something or making a decision to not do something. It's like Tom Hanks in 'The Green Mile' when he's listening to John Coffey through the prison cell. He just sits and listens, but somehow he also communicates pretty much every emotion known to man. I'm exaggerating, but only slightly. Great acting is when they make it look simple. They turn nothing into everything.

Wiig is beautiful, too. Not beautiful in the way that all the women in the movies are. Just beautiful in the way that women are beautiful. She's real. It's so much more interesting than looking at Megan Fox bouncing around in Transformers. I'm aware that women's looks always get mentioned when they're acting; I never review a Kevin Spacey film and then talk about his looks. But I guess my point here is --- in this film, and not just with Wiig, but with all of them -- they seem real. I can relate to them. They don't look like some insane and unrealistic 'dream girl'. And as a result, the women in 'Bridesmaids' are more appealing.

There are moments when Wiig will break your heart in this movie. There are times when she's jealous, resentful, lonely; in fact-- for most of the film, she is really lonely.



Yet she's also hilarious. Truthful pangs of loneliness but with big laughs. That's not easy to do. You just have to see her in this movie.

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