A romantic comedy that’s stranger than fiction.
You’ve probably haven’t heard of the new romantic comedy “Long Weekend,” of its one-minute trailer premiering a few weeks earlier, and it’s vague plot summary on IMDB. But if you have the time to even go on my website, watch my video reviews on YouTube, or even watch the trailer, you would now be more familiar with the movie.
In terms of it’s drama and comedy, I consider this movie an Oreo cookie. The cookies are the drama and the cream is the comedy. The laughs are between the serious moments. Either you’re going to find this interesting or walking out with weird remarks, that’s how I’m examining this movie. I, for one, found myself enjoying it for what it is. A love story we’ve seen before, will see again, and want to continue seeing.
We meet Bart (Finn Wittrock), an LA writer, who is in an unhappy situation with his mother passing, his fiancee dumping him, him going broke, moving in his friends’ (Damon Wayans, Jr. and Casey Wilson) garage, landing a crappy job (with Jim Rash as his funny new boss), and sneaking whiskey in his concession beverage at the movies. He’s currently a miserable sad sack with ignores his doctor’s and ex-fiancee’s calls.
Then, he falls asleep and is woken up by Vienna (Zoe Chao), who invites him for a drink. She just moved into town with a big wad of cash, no cell phone, no I.D., and no credit card, and she doesn’t explain to him why she moved into town. She just says she doesn’t know anyone in town, she broke her phone, she has a boring job, and she needed to escape from her sad life, which includes her cancer-stricken mother.
They spend the night playing with sparklers, the jukebox, casual drinks, and finish it off with the obligatory, happy, romantic sex. But he still wonders what her deal is, and finds out she’s from a research facility from the future in 2052. Sounds like “Happy Accidents,” doesn’t it? She’s here in the early 2020s to raise money in the stock market to save her mother, and he’s essential to her mission.
Before she revels the drama, this features the funniest scene in the movie when he says to her “You know “Back to the Future?,” and she responds: “It’s a classic. You’ve seen “Casablanca,” right?.” And when he brings up “Bill & Ted,” she doesn’t know who they are, and he says: “Oh, that’s not a classic.” I was laughing my ass off at how this time traveling joke is handled. And it’s just as funny as he tries to convince his friend Doug (Wayans, Jr.) he believes she’s from the future.
Sometimes it’s confusing and strange, but mostly, “Long Weekend” is a humorous and sweet directorial debut for Steve Basilone. At times, we question whether the girl is real or not since she has never met his friends and has only apologized to a young pedestrian he called “mam.” We’ve seen this kind of thing before and we can predict the outcome, and yet, somehow, we appreciate its sincerity.
Wittrock and Chao both portray familiar characters with complex situations, and you’re able to see the spark in them both. Even if the girl may or may not be a figment of the boy’s imagination, you still admire their characters for their tears, passion, and levity. And Wayans, Jr. also contributes some sentimental value as the best friend, who sticks by him, not matter what his mind is going through at the moment. Whether he believes him or not, or whether we believe this romance or not, it still works.
It’s starts off dramatic and emotional, then hilarious, and back to being dramatic and emotional again. That’s the pattern I saw in this movie, and I’ve enjoyed it.
Leave a Reply