How To Lose Friends & Alienate People
Film: How To Lose Friends & Alienate People
Director: Robert B. Weide
Starring: Simon Pegg, Kirsten Dunst
Runtime: 110 mins
Rating: * * * *
Based upon Toby Young’s novel, chronicling his misguided attempts to succeed as a journalsit in the US, this comedy employs just a little bit too much childish humour but manages to succeed on its own terms.
Simon Pegg, who by now must be the best in the world at playing charming losers, is perfectly cast as Sidney Young, a naïve, blundering journalist who is snapped up by one of New York’s biggest celebrity magazines. His blunt manners, deluded egotism and an innate talent for creating embarrassing situations immediately make him unpopular. Only one fellow writer, played by the likeable Kirsten Dunst, shows him any signs of friendship.
Pegg’s versatile facial muscles, earnest charm and sharp comic timing do very well to disguise this film’s lack of consistent tone and its tendency towards puerile slapstick. One minute a gross-out farce, the next a fuzzy romcom, the script lacks the wit and refreshing realism which put Judd Apatow’s movies at the head of this genre. How To Lose Friends & Alienate People provides real laughs when it focuses on Pegg’s buffoonery. The film does not need to resort to him falling off a swing, or the sight of a pig urinating at a party.
Other than Pegg, the film’s standout is, surprisingly, Megan Fox. Fresh from Transformers and using her status as an up and coming Hollywood babe, she plays a hilariously vapid star who is inexplicably awarded a Best Actress award for playing Mother Teresa. Watching actors send themselves up is always a rich comic vein is always a safe bet that is used to full advantage.
Ultimately, How To Lose Friends… is not as sharp or satirical as it could have been, but as a comedy pf errors or simply as a vehicle for Pegg, it works.
Loading ...