Something rare happened this weekend; Hollywood released a comedy that I didn’t hate. Game Night is the story of a newlywed couple whose drive for competition leads them to run a weekly game night at their house. When Max’s (Jason Bateman) brother Brooks (Kyle Chandler) comes to town, things get crazy when they set up an interactive mystery game that gets too real after Brooks is kidnapped and the game night crew are now in a race for time to save his life.

Game Night is a screwball comedy that works for the simple fact it doesn’t allow its humor to become obnoxious. Unlike most comedies today, the film sets up an interesting story and works its humor around it instead of half-assing a story and expecting their actors to improv their way into making a watchable film, which fails 9/10 times. The humor is pretty dark, making light of such topics as death, guns, and violence. Nobody in the film feels wasted, even the minor characters get a chance to shine while having a purpose. A great scene involves the game night crew running around a mansion trying to steal an object from a group of criminals. Well thought out and creative sequences like this by directors John Francis and Daley Jonathan Goldstein (who also co-wrote films such a Spiderman: Homecoming) makes the film easy to enjoy and look past some of the plot holes in the story. Probably my biggest complaint here is the fact that Game Night goes on about 15 minutes too long. Right when you think the film has wrapped up a nice story, it keeps going and drags on with a subplot that wasn’t really needed even if Michael C. Hall’s cameo was a pleasant surprise. Game Night is easily the best comedy that Hollywood has produced in some time, hopefully, they take this blueprint and try to improve the overall product.

3/5

Don’t Forget to Like and Subscribe to Twitter For Updates. Also, Follow This Blog at Society-Reviews