Vacation Friends

Is the emergence of streaming platforms a good thing for cinema or a new way to offer more or less successful films that can thus meet their audience more easily. In the case of Vacation Friends, the question seems to be asked as this film seems to have been conceived in the 90's and reminds us of the comedies in which Arnold Schwarzenegger tried to broaden his acting skills by moving away from the action movies that made his glory for comedies a little heavy and often disappointing. The director and co-writer Clay Tarver, known for being the executive producer and co-showrunner of the excellent series Silicon Valley, offers here his first film which, while not revolutionizing comedy, is rather refreshing and punctuated with good and fiercely destructive scenes.

Nowadays, it is impossible to travel far away, so discovering a movie taking place far from our big cities and in a paradisiacal landscape is always a good way to remind us of our life before the pandemic. We discover Marcus and Emily (Lil Rel Howery, Yvonne Orji) who come to rest in a seaside resort in Mexico. Marcus seems to have everything planned to propose to Emily in a fancy hotel, but things don't go as he had hoped. Deprived of their suite due to flooding from a couple of partygoers who are eager for thrills Ron and Kyla (John Cena, Meredith Hagner). While nothing predestined them to meet these two couples will learn to live together in the same hotel room and do the 400 knocks. But this is only the beginning of a friendship that will be tested even when they return from vacation months later and especially when Ron and Kyla arrive at Marcus and Emily's wedding without having been invited. 

This first film of The Walt Disney studio to be simultaneously proposed worldwide (Star on Disney+ internationally and on Hulu in the United States) from this day reveals itself to be a comedy that seems to be a caricature of American society in which there is a real melting pot both cultural and based on different values. These two couples represent two faces of today's America, one that only sees life as fun and prefers to devour life immediately and another that tries to build real things through time and live by themselves without having to account for or enjoy privileges granted from birth. 

The numerous oppositions between the two couples, Marcus and Emily and Ron and Kyla, give this comedy all its strength but also reveal some obvious script weaknesses. A bit as if the script originally written by Tom and Tim Mullen for the couple in town Chris Pratt and Anna Faris in 2014 had evolved following the latter's separation and departure from the initial cast to become a real vehicle for John Cena and Lil Rel Howery (currently starring in the excellent Free Guy). The tone of the film sounds quite 90's and the director Clay Tarver doesn't seem to control the rhythm of his film. The result is a somewhat chaotic montage breaking the film into two clear parts, one taking place in Mexico and the other in the United States during Marcus and Emily's wedding. The first part proves to be the best as it is so rhythmic and manages to make us really laugh. The one taking place during the wedding lacks conviction at times, especially compared to cult comedies such as Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), which remains the best comedy about marriage to this day. 

As much as John Cena knew how to impose himself in action movies like the excellent 12 Rounds (2009), Bumblebee (2018), F9 (2021) and The Suicide Squad (2021), he seems to follow the footsteps of Arnold Schwarzenegger in comedies often bland. Vacation Friends is therefore not the comedy of the summer and far from it, but it can be watched and forgotten as quickly. It's a pity not to have followed the footsteps of Serial noceurs (Wedding Crashers) (2005) by daring to shock voluntarily and to leave the too cosy frame of Hollywood comedies too formatted to really please.

Vacation Friends
Directed by Clay Tarver
Written by Tom Mullen, Tim Mullen, Clay Tarver, Jonathan Goldstein, John Francis Daley
Produced by Todd Garner, Timothy M. Bourne
Starring John Cena, Lil Rel Howery, Yvonne Orji, Meredith Hagner, Robert Wisdom, Lynn Whitfield, Andrew Bachelor
Music by Rolfe Kent
Cinematography : Tim Suhrstedt
Edited by Evan Henke
Production companies : 20th Century Studios, Broken Road Productions
Distributed by Hulu (United States), Disney + (France)
Release date : August 27, 2021 (United States, France)
Running time : 104 minutes

Seen on August 20, 2021

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