52 Films by Women Vol 3. 24. BLOCKERS (Director: Kay Cannon)
Not all parents want to interfere
with their children’s sex lives. That’s why they give them sweaters. But
parents can voice their disapproval of a potential suitor. He or she might not
be ‘good enough’. Alternatively, the parent might have an in-built prejudice
that surfaces at dinner and manifests itself by placing the suitor under
hypnosis in order to perform surgery.
About that plot flaw in Get
Out - did that film really deserve the Best Screenplay Oscar? If you
are part of a nasty conspiracy and you place that nice young man that your daughter
is dating into a trance, you aren’t going to give him time to figure out what
you are up to – you are gonna get right to it.
However, this isn’t a
retrospective whinge about why Lady Bird was robbed at the 2018
Oscar ceremony by a so-called ‘smart’ horror film (reader, Gerwig was held up
at gub point). This is about a modest box office success called Blockers
directed but not written by Kay Cannon.
Blockers has a script by
a bunch of guys – Brian Kehoe, Jim Kehoe, Jon Hurwitz, Hayden Schlossberg and
Eben Russell, Cannon’s spouse. The latter three writers may have lost their
credit in some WGA (Writers Guild of America) wrangle. Cannon, an established
writer (30 Rock, Pitch Perfect), is nowhere near the screenplay. So is this a film
‘by’ a woman – especially as the producers are Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg? I
wonder. It does prove – if anyone had any doubts and collectively ‘forgot’
Penelope Spheeris, Penny Marshall and Amy Heckerling – that women can direct
mainstream comedy. A woman can point a camera towards John Cena’s rear-end as
he chugs beer through his rectum just as well as a man. Some might say better.
The film is what’s called in
Hollywood an ensemble comedy - this means no one was paid really well. Its
stars are Leslie Mann, John Cena and Ike Barinholtz, who all play parents with
teenage daughters in some American suburb. It’s Prom Night (when is it never)
and Julie (Kathryn Newton), Sam (Gideon Adlon) and Kayla (Geraldine
Viswanathan) have made a pact with each other to lose their virginity. The
first sex is not the best sex, right? So why not get it out of the way at a
lame party. Mom might have paid $150 for the dress but you only wear it the once
just like that outfit you put on for a police line up. I can imagine a victim
of a violent crime asked to identify the assailant and saying, ‘I don’t know –
I really hate his slacks.’
Cena, a former professional
wrestler turned action hero turned comedy stooge, plays Mitchell. If you are a
real guy in a movie, you don’t need a surname (just ask Arnie). Mitchell has
been content to be the only man in Kayla’s life. He gets emotional. Lisa (Mann) treats daughter Julie like a
sister. She’s a single mom who isn’t looking for anyone else. Hunter
(Barinholtz) is the ultra-compensating yet chilled guy who is late to the
party, on account of not being invited. He and Sam’s mom had a bitter break-up
and he cannot stand the guy who has replaced him. Although he doesn’t have a
job, Hunter ordered a limo to take the girls to Prom, because if you are going
to get needlessly into debt, you should do so with a vehicle your daughter is
likely to defile with vomit.
Mitchell and Lisa get wind of the
pact and want to stop it. They are archly conservative. The inference is that
they believe that sex is something you save for your wedding night or as
leverage. Hunter is chilled. He thinks his daughter is a lesbian. ‘A father
knows,’ he explains. Just exactly how does a father ‘know’? I don’t want to go
there.
Not everybody remembers when they
lost their virginity. (I’m tempted to add, ‘especially if Rohypnol is
involved’, but that’s just wrong.) I happen to remember January 29, 1990 very
well. It was a Monday. Anyway, they usually remember the other person on
account of the texts, emails or reverse charged calls. Lisa and Mitchell learn
to lighten up about sex, without actually having any and the girls – well, I
won’t spoil it.
Ostensibly, Blockers is a distant
cousin to those gross out comedies in which at least one Hollywood star is
shown in a compromising position. However, it is also a film that references
the Fast
and Furious movies, specially
the non-catchphrase ‘What Would Vin Diesel do?’ I mean, he did The
Last Witch Hunter and Babylon A.D., so it doesn’t exactly
matter what Vin Diesel does. This line occurs when the three parents chase the
limo driver. He’s the kind of guy who says ‘what happens in the car stays in
the car’, thus accounting for those hard to remove faecal stains. The comedy
depends for its motor on Julie leaving her phone behind. This is completely
unrealistic; how could anyone celebrate prom without a camera? The fun comes
from three adults attempting to crash a variety of parties in which everyone
else under the age of twenty. They must have thought Cena was Magic Mike.
I particularly hate the phrase
‘What Would Vin Diesel do?’ because both Blockers and Fast and Furious are
released by Universal Studios. I mean, what next – Julie has a Pitch
Perfect poster in her room? (Wait, she does.) The belly laughs come
from the parents breaking into a house of Julie’s boyfriend only to discover
his parents (Gary Cole, Gina Gershon) are playing a blind nude sex game. Then
Lisa ends up trapped in a room when her daughter is about to be deflowered.
The film’s best scene has a
parent protest that Lisa is wrong to be concerned about her daughter. That’s
why women fought for sexual liberation. The film depicts a false sense of moral
panic. Therein is the problem: why should we care about the characters’
wrong-headed quest?
At its heart, Blockers
celebrates lesbian lust and has a coming-out scene that is gently done. When it
comes to same-sex love, as long as it is introduced near the beginning of the
film, the audience won’t be shocked by the revelation. The final scene is
cringe-worthy, mainly because Cannon’s sure sense of comedy deserts her.
Should parents worry about the
choices that their children make? Absolutely! My son opted not to go to Farnham
School of Art, instead to the University of Gloucestershire, where the tutors
skive off during the Cheltenham Horse Racing Festival (at least you know where
the University fees go). But how much should they worry? There is a point at
which children can stand on their own two feet. Twenty years later and you
shouldn’t panic.
Reviewed at Cineworld West India Quay, East London, Tuesday 3 April
2018
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