Judd Apatow movies haves generally been hit or miss for me in the past. I've never straight-up disliked any of his movies, but some of them I laugh at less than others.
Trainwreck is one of his movies I found myself laughing less at. It's by no means a bad movie, but I have a few problems with it, and that just isn't helped by the fact that a lot of the time I didn't find it funny.
Amy Schumer plays Amy, a commitment-phobic, hard-drinking woman, a writer for a magazine who is assigned a piece involving an interview with a sports doctor named Aaron (Bill Hader). When Aaron turns out to be a great guy, Amy realises she may have to confront some deeper emotions.
When I say I often didn't find it funny, that doesn't mean I never found it funny. I like the idea of role reversal here, with Schumer playing essentially a woman version of Apatow's usual emotionally immature man-child. The scene where Amy firsts interviews Aaron, a scene involving Amy and her sort-of boyfriend Steven (John Cena), there are some golden moments. Part of this is because in these moments, Amy feels natural, and her jokes are delivered well. Her character arc is also the highlight of the film; the ways in which she attempts to avoid or deal with her better feelings are worth more than a few chuckles. The aforementioned Cena, as well as LeBron James (playing himself) are also very fun to watch.
However, the whole experience is inconsistent. For every joke where Amy feels natural, there's one where it seems like I'm no longer watching the character Amy, but the comedian Amy Schumer awkwardly trying to work a comedy bit into her dialogue. The occasional meta narration from Schumer feels out of place because of how little it actually happens. There's also multiple plot threads that ultimately blow the movie's run time up to over two hours, which would be fine if these threads didn't start to meander by the time we get in to the final third.
The Verdict: Trainwreck is a decent romantic comedy that works better in its romantic moments than its comedy moments. It's overly long, dragging towards the end, but it creates a really strong character arc in Amy that never fails to be honest. Definitely not for children, but I recommend this movie to people who like Schumer's humour or are looking for an offbeat romance.
Rating: 6/10
Watched January 11th, 2016, Published July 7th, 2016
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