Talk about couple’s therapy.
“Over Your Dead Body” is another one of those violent IFC Films that have more courage than a lot of commercial films that overdose on the comedy and violence. It’s is a remake of the Norwegian film “The Trip” directed by Tommy Wirkola, whose “Thrash” is already unfortunately a Netflix hit. And I think it makes more sense that this film is shown in theaters, while that one is online. It also features a variety of colorful characters in dangerous territory, but they’re much better acted here than Djimon Hounsou or Phoebe Dynevor in that routine shark movie. In fact, “Over Your Dead Body” might as well be a shark movie, if that’s how these people are going to behave and bite one another.
Jason Segel and Samara Weaving play an unhappily married couple named Dan and Lisa, who must pretend to be one happy couple for a weekend in the woods. Unknown to each other, they plan to kill each other. Just as he’s about to take out his wife, she gains the upper hand, and calls his bluff and stupidity. I’m surprised his friends weren’t the guys from “Horrible Bosses” at this point. And just as she’s about to kill him, he gains the upper hand.
Here are some motives for why they currently hate each other. He is a former filmmaker-turned commercial director, while she is a struggling actress. She calls his work “Pop Up Ads,” while he says her work isn’t “Broadway.” He tells her she’s always criticizing him, while she tells him he’s a decade older than her but is irresponsible and childish. Or it could be the insurance money to set one of them free from their pathos. There can be a lot of motives.
The plot changes course. Dan has his friend Henry (Jake Curran) coming in to help with the would-be slaying, but it doesn’t work out for him. And then comes two escaped convicted killers-Keith (Timothy Olyphant) and Todd (former UFC and Strikeforce fighter Keith Jardine) who aided by a dirty prison guard named Allegra (Juliette Lewis). She and Keith are in love, Todd is the big guy, and all of them hold Dan and Lisa hostage with nicknames Ron and Hermione. I think you know what these criminals’ motives are: money.
Wirkola is credited as an executive producer of “Over Your Dead Body,” while Jorma Taccone of The Lonely Island is the new director. Weaving is no stranger to dodging killers (I think the “Ready or Not” movies have established that), while Olyphant and Lewis have respectively played killers before (the best for him in “Scream 2,” and the best for her in “Natural Born Killers”), so they all fit well with the genre. And Segel specializes in different kinds of comedies (from “Knocked Up” and “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” to the hit AppleTV series “Shrinking”), so he’s required to add some slapstick and awkwardness to help elevate the humor level. And they, along with Jardine and Paul Guilfoyle (as Dan’s war vet retiree father), have the kind of dialogue that keeps on biting. It’s all within the attitude of the movie, and maybe it works as a therapy for the couple.
A would-be rape scene is uncomfortable to watch, especially by today’s standards, but it doesn’t go into fruition nor does it last as long as in “Irreversible.” The story goes all over the place, where we get the characters, and the “6 Hours Earlier” or “3 Days Earlier” cards, and I guess every perspective matters. And there’s a lot of gore that usually divides moviegoers based on their taste in the genre. It’s the kind where you go: “Ewww” or “Owww,” and therefore, you know you’re in for a fun time. Or this could be reading the “How to Make a Violent Movie” book.