Name: Man Up (2015)
IMDb: link to Man Up page
Genres: Comedy, Romance Country of origin: UK.
Cast: Simon Pegg as Jack, Lake Bell as Nancy Patterson, Sharon Horgan as Elaine, Harriet Walter as Fran, Ken Stott as Bert, Olivia Williams as Hilary, Ophelia Lovibond as Jessica, Rory Kinnear as Sean Mallory.
Directed by: Ben Palmer. Written by: Tess Morris.
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| image courtesy of TMDb |
The Three Acts:
The initial tableaux:
Single 34 year old Nancy goes to a loud themed mixer hosted by a hotel at the insistence of her married sister Elaine. It's another failure.
Nancy heads via train to an anniversary party at the house of their parents, Fran and Bert. Nancy sits down and talks to Elaine. Across from her is Jessica, who had listened to her telephone conversation with Elaine. Jessica lends Nancy a self-help book meant to help her meet her true match. The train stops; Jessica gets off without taking the book. When Nancy wakes up, she tries to find Jessica to return the book, but meets Jack instead. (Jessica buys another copy; she had left her old copy on purpose, but Nancy does not know that.)
Jack thinks Nancy is his blind date since she has the book. Jack has a pleasant manner, and does a Hannibal Lecter impression. Partly because Lecter is one of Nancy's favourite movie characters, she decides to let Jack keep thinking she's his date. Jessica shows up with her new copy of the book a good 90 seconds too late.
Delineation of conflicts:
First, there is the lie that started their relationship. Jack and Nancy head into an evening together under false impressions. Nancy has several opportunities in their conversation to correct the misapprehension, but fails to do so.
During the date, they encounter some baggage from each side. There is Jack's ex, or soon to be ex, Hilary, whom they meet with Hilary's new significant other. Then there is Sean, whom Nancy has known for many years but does not remember. Unfortunately for Nancy, Sean's a bit of a stalker.
Jack is a bit battle weary from the recently failed marriage. Nancy is in a negativity phase since she has had so many disappointments in a row.
Then there is the party with Fran and Bert. Elaine and Fran want Nancy to write something to commemorate the 40 years of wedded bliss. When might that happen during this busy day?
Resolution: Chemistry.
One line summary: Blind date with the wrong person.
Statistics:
Cinematography: 8/10 The camera work looks fine, but the sets are endlessly prosaic. Of course, that's what the movie is about: ordinary people doing ordinary things in ordinary places.
Sound: 8/10 No problems. The background music included some fine tunes.
Acting: 8/10 I liked Lake Bell in Surface (2005) and Over Her Dead Body (2008), but have not seen her work much since. As for Simon Pegg, I liked him a lot in Shaun of the Dead (2004) and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (2011).
As for this movie, the rest of the cast provided competent performances. The movie sank or swam based on the screen chemistry between Pegg's character and Bell's character. In the early going, Nancy was evasive (she's lying left and right, not in her skill set) and Jack was nervously expansive since he wants the date to go well. This was awkward to say the least. The chemistry starts to show when they connect on movie after movie, book after book, bowling and eating.
Perhaps the best part was when the lies start to be burned away by truth. Pegg and Bell really go at in realistic ways that are funny as well. The dancing scenes were marvelous: they don't slow dance well, but they were in perfect sync for Duran Duran's The Reflex (1984).
Screenplay: 7/10 Awkwardness was displayed aplenty as is common in romantic comedies. However, this was done, for the most part, without making the people in the awkward situations seem like terrible people (well, except Sean, perhaps).
I got some laughs from watching this film, which is where most romantic comedies fail.
Final rating: 8/10
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