Drinking Buddies (Movie Review)

To call Joe Swanberg's Drinking Buddies a "romantic comedy" would be a disservice. While it is comedic, it doesn't attempt to elicit a laugh every minute, and while there is romance, it most certainly is not romanticized. Rather than painting in the typical broad strokes of Hollywood extremes, it is a down to earth look at relationships focusing far more on uncomfortable silences than canned banter and magical fix-all endings.

The four leads each bring their own built-in likability to their respective parts, playing off one another in such natural fashion that it's no surprise to learn the movie was completely improvised. As Chris, the first to notice something not-quite-right in his love life, Ron Livingston offers the same droll delivery that made him the easy hero of Office Space; Anna Kendrick is an adorable bundle of insecurity as Luke's better half Jill, clumsily broaching the subject of marriage on a few occasions; Olivia Wilde not only further demonstrates her surprising comedic talent, but her chemistry with wiseass Jake Johnson (who I haven't seen in anything else but earns my respect with his epic beard alone) is so palpable that - while their routinely good-natured snipes at one another are invariably fun times - the film's single funniest scene is two-minute static shot of the pair wherein not a single word is spoken.

"Convention-free" would probably be the best way to describe the film. There is no colorful big-city backdrop. No despicable romantic rival to root against. No emotionally-keyed soundtrack to tell the audience how to feel; in fact there's hardly a soundtrack or score at all. No right thing said at just the right time. No overdramatic soliloquies on the nature of true love. No obstacle over which love conquers all. No evil boss at whom lead character will triumphantly blow up, unless one counts an uncredited Jason Sudeikis in an extended cameo - there is a blowup that serves at the film's climax, but there's nothing triumphant about it; it's simply an outpouring of emotions bubbling over at the wrong time and aimed in the wrong direction.

Human authenticity is the hub around which the movie is built, and where it succeeds the most. Characters make bad decisions, but they're played as the faults of ordinary people, not caricatures or cardboard cutouts serving the convenience of the plot. Because they all come off as genuinely decent people, their emotional ordeals are all the more affecting, even when the movie skips over such developments like Kate and Chris' initial breakup; we never actually see it, the but the reasons for it happening are made perfectly clear, and as neither is made out to be the "bad guy", we feel equally bad for them both. There is no easy moral to the story; the major conflicts are internal, and as real people are wont to do, important things often remain unsaid.

This is the film's surprise attractor, its ability to say the most when none of the characters are speaking at all. The relationships - chiefly Kate and Luke's but Luke and Jill's as well - are defined just as much, if not more, in the silence as in the speech; in their gestures, physical proximity, and sleepy and/or inebriated embraces. That will probably be what drives some viewers away from the movie, the idea that such "dead air" need be filled with dialogue, when ideally they ought to walk away with something at least vaguely reminiscent of a murky romantic experience in their own lives.

If there are any concrete criticisms to make, it's only that there are  a few fleeting moments of artificiality present in the film's more dramatic moments, namely in one unfortunate happenstance hitting Kate just after her failed attempt to reconnect with Chris. It's an instance of rubbing salt in an open wound that momentarily took me out of the film, even granting that such moments (in which one is left to think, "Oh Jesus, how can this get any worse?") do occur regularly in real life. For a movie aiming to avoid convention, it's probably the most conventional development in the entire affair, but one that not by a long shot ruins a thing.

Drinking Buddies defies expectations of movie romance and comedy with a little harsh reality mixed with its sincere portrayals of friendship and courtship. At a lean ninety minutes it doesn't overstay its welcome; as a romance, it doesn't overplay its drama; and as a comedy, it doesn't overstretch itself to make a joke. And thanks in no small part to a lack of manipulative tropes, it is a more authentic storytelling experience, thus more involving than the average or even above-average romantic comedy.