Movie Review: The Lovebirds

The Lovebirds ** / *****

Directed by: Michael Showalter.

Written by: Aaron Abrams and Brendan Gall and Martin Gero.

Starring: Kumail Nanjiani (Jibran), Issa Rae (Leilani), Anna Camp (Edie), Paul Sparks (Moustache), Kyle Bornheimer (Brett), Kelly Murtagh (Evonne), Moses Storm (Steve), Barry Rothbart (Mr. Hipster), Aaron Abrams (Paramedic).

 

Kumail Nanjiani and Issa Rae both deserve better than The Lovebirds – a rather lifeless comedy that the pair nevertheless do their best to breathe life into. They play Jibran and Leilani – who we first meet in the aftermath of a would-be one-night stand, that turns into a real date, which turns into a relationship. Flash forward four years, and the pair are living together, but don’t seem to like each other much. He thinks she, and her obsession with reality shows and social media, is shallow, she thinks he, a documentary filmmaker who spends all his time editing a documentary he may never finish, is satisfied with being a failure. They break up, but still have to go on a ride together in their car. It’s then that they hit a biker with their car. The biker immediately gets up, says its okay, and takes off. But then a cop jumps into their car, takes over driving, chases down the biker and runs him over – repeatedly, showing, of course, that he wasn’t a cop after all. Jibran and Leilani aren’t dumb enough – or white enough – to turn themselves into the cops, so they take the dead man’s cell phone, and try to crack the mystery of his death,

 

The film is supposed to be a comedy or remarriage – popular in the 1940s, where divorced or on their way to being divorced, couples find themselves drawn back together by circumstances beyond their control. Here, it doesn’t really work for a few reasons – the most fatal of which is that while Nanjiani and Rae are great comedic presences, and both are trying really hard here, they never quite feel like a couple either pulled apart, or put back together. Perhaps they could have been that, had they not been forced into such an inane plot, full of would-be set pieces that don’t really work – like Anna Camp, doing a Southern accent, and threatening the pair with bacon grease, or a comedic climax right out of Eyes Wide Shut. If there was a way to make this work, screenwriters Aaron Abrams, Brandan Gall and Martin Gero and director Michael Showalter, don’t find it.

 

There are isolated moments, mostly in Nanjiani and Rae’s performances, that do work. Nanjiani is perfectly playing the exasperated everyman, and his asides, or sometimes just tired sighs, are downright hilarious. Rae is able to deliver the perfect cutting insult (the best of which “Did you think it was one of those male only doors”) that can elevate rather lame, would-be one liners.

 

But none of it ever really comes together in a meaningful way. The Big Sick proved that Nanjiani is a movie star – and showed just how solid a director Michael Showalter can be. But here, they are stuck going through the motions – going through one tired set piece after another, and the film never lets the characters breathe. It also never really embraces its dark comic potential after the opening sequence with the biker. This is a Netflix film that was supposed to be a big screen release – sold by its studio after the Covid-19 breakout. It fits perfectly well on Netflix, beside all the other tired programmers – wasting talent and time.