The Guilt Trip

 

In the long history of strange Hollywood team ups, the combination of Seth Rogen and Barbara Streisand has to be one of the more bizarre in recent memory.  Walking into The Guilt Trip, I wasn't sure what to expect.  Fortunately, they end up working quite well together as a stereotypical Jewish mother, and her silently suffering adult son.  The movie gives them plenty of chances to play off each other, and they do so quite well.  If only the rest of the movie worked as well as its mismatched leading team.

This is an average road trip comedy written by the usually talented Dan Fogelman, who has been on quite the streak lately with his scripts.  Some of his recent credits include last year's wonderful Crazy Stupid Love, and the Disney animated comedy, Tangled.  This movie isn't bad enough to completely derail his momentum, but it is a definite step backwards.  Here, he seems to be lacking a certain amount of energy with his comedic writing.  Maybe his heart wasn't in this one.  The movie follows the basic rules of the "mismatched pair go on a road trip together" formula, which has produced some good films in the past. (Most notably, 1987's Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.) It hits all the obligatory notes, such as run-ins in bars, encounters with colorful characters, and the scene in the motel room where tempers between the pair finally flares up.  It has all the right pieces assembled, but they don't fit together like they should.

It's up to Rogen and Streisand to carry this material with their chemistry, and while they do their best, the leaden script holds them down somewhat.  Rogen plays Andrew Brewster, a struggling young inventor who is about to embark on an 8-day cross country business trip in an attempt to sell his product to different chain stores.  He's trying to get an environmentally safe cleaning product he invented off the ground.  Streisand is his widowed, meddling mother, Joyce.  She hasn't had anyone in her life since her husband died when Andrew was only eight years old.  Sensing her loneliness, Andrew decides to invite her to come along with him on the trip.  His ultimate goal in bringing her along is that he hopes he can help her reconnect with a man that she once loved before she married his father.

Joyce starts the film off as a typical, stereotyped Jewish mother that we've seen in countless bad movies and sitcoms.  But then, the movie starts to peel away that side of the character, and make her a little more human and sympathetic.  This is the part of the film I liked.  It's during these scenes that the chemistry between the stars starts to show.  When Rogen and Streisand are just having quiet scenes where they get to play off one another, they actually do show a lot of warmth, and create a believable relationship.  If only the rest of The Guilt Trip was this honest.  Whenever the movie's not focused on the likable chemistry of its leading actors, it decides to bore us with perfunctory cliches of the road trip movie, such as bar fights, crazy hitchhikers, and quirky characters with hearts of gold.

I normally wouldn't mind these cliches so much, as they practically come with the genre.  We expect them to be in there when we see a movie like this.  The problem, I think, lies with the director, Anne Fletcher (The Proposal).  There is a lack of energy to these comic moments.  Everything's so muted and laid back.  We're supposed to feel Andrew's exasperation as these bizarre situations and encounters build up, along with having his nagging mother in the car seat next to him.  But, he never seems anything more than mildly annoyed.  Even when he finally blows up at her emotionally, it doesn't have the anger we expect.  He's not lashing out at her, he's just...irritated, at best.  If you want to see this kind of scene done right, I must once again bring up Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.  Watch the scene where Steve Martin finally lets John Candy have it with his frustrated tirade of anger.  Watch how Candy reacts with genuine sadness.  That is a masterclass on how you do this kind of scene.

 

I will admit to smiling a number of times while watching The Guilt Trip.  I will even admit to laughing out loud once.  Is that enough to recommend it?  I don't think so.  There's going to be some heavy competition over the holiday weekend, so there's bound to be something better playing in just a couple days.  If you want a good indication of what this movie could have been, just watch the improvised outtakes during the end credits between Rogen and Streisand, which end up being funnier than anything in the movie itself.  Maybe the filmmakers should have just tossed the script out, and just let the stars go at each other.

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