{"id":1337,"date":"2018-04-13T03:09:26","date_gmt":"2018-04-13T03:09:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/2018\/04\/13\/3-bags-of-tostitos-game-night\/"},"modified":"2024-12-30T17:28:07","modified_gmt":"2024-12-30T17:28:07","slug":"3-bags-of-tostitos-game-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/2018\/04\/13\/3-bags-of-tostitos-game-night\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Bags of Tostitos"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

For as long as I can remember, I have had a strained relationship with board games. When I was a child, once a month or on certain holidays, my mother would take me to a neighbors house for their game night. Children under 13 were not allowed to play, so the underlings were sent off to play with toys and video games. But throughout the house, you could hear the laughing and I desperately wanted to be a part of that. The room was always heavy with smoke and smelled of cheap beer, which is probably why I find the smell comforting. By the time I was old enough to play, these gatherings had stopped, and I graduated to nerdy D&D circles where the group couldn\u2019t be bothered to pay attention between turns. Still, this really didn\u2019t compare to what I thought was happening on my neighbors\u2019 smokey, ruckus game room. Despite never attending a successful one, I decided to take a chance and see Game Night<\/b>. Maybe it could offer some insight and I would finally have closure. It turns out, playing games with friends might not be as delicate as my memories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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(Center) JESSE PLEMONS as Gary in New Line Cinema’s action comedy “GAME NIGHT,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Now, I had reservations about Game Night<\/b>. I like watching Jason Bateman<\/a> with his signature wry wit, but there should be a limit to how many times you can cast that. I won\u2019t say I was wrong, but it plays just as well here as anywhere else. Max (Jason Bateman<\/a>) and his wife Annie (Rachel McAdams<\/a>) are born to compete in trivial games. Their love of board games brings together their friends, middle school sweethearts Michelle (Kylie Bunbury<\/a>) and Kevin (Lamorne Morris<\/a>), and some douche they like named Ryan (Billy Magnussen<\/a>) and his girl of the week Sarah (Sharon Horgan<\/a>), while they hide the proverbial night from their neighbor and recent divorcee Gary (Jesse Plemons<\/a>). Everything comes full tilt when Max\u2019s charismatic, affluent older brother Brooks (Kyle Chandler<\/a>) comes to town. Boyhood rivalry has followed them well into adulthood, Max always trailing behind his big brother Brooks, a fact his friends never let him forget. The comedy really revolves around the board game gang as they get banged around after a night at Brooks goes awry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Upfront, you won\u2019t be leaving this theater remembering any of the punchlines, but the overall performances. As I sit here writing this, I can\u2019t recall a single joke. Plemons consistently delivers as a dark, brooding cop who can\u2019t seem to communicate in any socially acceptable way. There were moments when I doubted this gag, but it just kept growing on me throughout the film. Morris has an amazing gag and impersonation that kills. Magnussen at no point tries to be lovable, but instead plays nicely against the smart and quick Sarah. It\u2019s not that they have a particularly strong chemistry, but it\u2019s a fun bit with a bunch of first date jokes. The rest of the cast are kind of par for the course, save a few surprise faces which I won\u2019t ruin for you here. They all perform well in their respective pairs and as an ensemble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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So, yea. You\u2019ll laugh in the moment, but after my first viewing, I can\u2019t imagine anything in this film while stick with you. And that isn\u2019t to say its bad, its just not memorable. I can still remember jokes from films like Superbad and Coneheads, and those have almost 15 years between them. Shit, I remember jokes from last year\u2019s Baywatch. I think comedy films should aim for something that sticks beyond a few sight gags and pratfalls. This is fun evening with good company if you both can lighten up and enjoy the performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

~* 6.5\/10 *~<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Game Night<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1810,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[741,746,268,736,737,743,744,739,740,738,9,742,745],"class_list":["post-1337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-film-reviews","category-reviews","tag-billy-magnussen","tag-coneheads","tag-film","tag-game-night","tag-jason-bateman","tag-jesse-plemons","tag-kyle-chandler","tag-kylie-bunbury","tag-lamone-morris","tag-rachel-mcadams","tag-reviews","tag-sharon-horgan","tag-superbad"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1337"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1337\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2218,"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1337\/revisions\/2218"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/avoutput.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}