No Hard Feelings
Jennifer Lawrence’s implausible comedy of embarrassment is often excruciating, but not always for the right reasons.
Jennifer Lawrence and Andrew Barth Feldman. (Image courtesy of Sony Pictures)
There’s a terrific scene in No Hard Feelings, and it’s played entirely at Jennifer Lawrence’s expense. She portrays a 32-year-old Uber driver (without a car) who gatecrashes a students’ house party. Much fun is made of her maturity, an ongoing embarrassment that’s deployed as a running joke. While male movie stars twice her age (she really is 32) are romancing women on screen young enough to be their daughters, JLaw – whose production company Excellent Cadaver co-financed the movie – is playing the opposite game.
She is Maddie Barker who, in order to pay her back taxes – and save her house – agrees to ‘date’ a man 13 years her junior in return for a Buick Regal. Percy Becker’s parents (Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti) are concerned that their 19-year-old son is ill-prepared for college (he’s got himself into Princeton) and feel that he needs a few life lessons first. Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman) rarely leaves the security of his own bedroom, doesn’t drink or drive and can seldom break himself away from his phone (“I have tons of friends – online,” he boasts). So, desperate for employment (her car has been repossessed), Maddie agrees to educate Percy in the ways of all flesh.
It's actually a rather creepy scenario (imagine if the sexes had been reversed) – and hardly a novel one. The inevitable turns out to be predictable and as appealing as Jennifer Lawrence is as an actress, her Maddie is a terrifying figure (“It’s like you’re trying to eat me,” sweats Percy, without irony). Had the director/co-writer Gene Stupnitsky (Good Boys) opted for a blacker tone – and harnessed JLaw’s dark arts as a performer – the film could’ve been a lot funnier. However, Stupnitsky plays the safe card, whipping up a vaguely smutty sitcom with none of the verve, daring or smarts of, say, Long Shot.
Many a similarly contrived romcom has squeezed out genuine emotion between its two principals, but the chemistry between the gormless Feldman and the predatory JLaw refuses to combust. There are a few incidental pleasures, and a sprinkling of good lines (“I don’t bite – unless you want me to”), but the film is mildly diverting at best.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Jennifer Lawrence, Andrew Barth Feldman, Laura Benanti, Matthew Broderick, Natalie Morales, Scott MacArthur, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Kyle Mooney, Hasan Minhaj, Jordan Mendoza, Amalia Yoo, Quincy Dunn-Baker.
Dir Gene Stupnitsky, Pro Alex Saks, Naomi Odenkirk, Marc Provissiero, Jennifer Lawrence and Justine Ciarrocchi, Screenplay Gene Stupnitsky and John Phillips, Ph Eigil Bryld, Pro Des Russell Barnes, Ed Brent White, Music Mychael Danna and Jessica Rose Weiss, Costumes Kirston Mann and Kirston Leigh Mann.
Columbia Pictures/Saks Picture Company/Odenkirk Provissiero Entertainment/Excellent Cadaver-Sony Pictures.
103 mins. USA. 2023. UK Rel: 21 June 2023. US Rel: 23 June 2023. Cert. 15.
