The second 15-rated movie in town this weekend has to do with a choppy new friendship between two male neighbours. From accepting an invitation to hang out, via stalking, to appearing blasé about the disappearance of his wife, Craig, an app developer, descends a long way and loses a great deal in “Friendship” (Republic Pictures), showing now at the Montrose Playhouse.
Craig is played by comedian Tim Robinson, whose trump card—awkward comments—is played straight away. “I didn’t open [your parcel] or look into it,” he says, “I know that’s illegal.” His civic duty to the neighbourhood relates to traffic control: “I actually got those speed bumps put on our street.” And then, after an estate agent leads prospective buyers from his house, which is on the market, he quips, “Didn’t steal anything, did you?” as they walk past. Needless to say, they scuttle off without looking back. When charismatic Austin, a television weatherman sporting a very obvious toupee, played by Paul Rudd, invites Craig to go on an adventure with him, Craig replies, “It’s a school night for me.” But it’s too tempting. Austin has something Craig wants, badly—he is cool. It’s not just the job on television but the whole nine yards: the buddies, the band, the risk taking. And so, off they go—sliding through a locked fence, clambering into massive old water pipes, emerging on the roof of city hall—like a couple of Ealing-comedy cat burglars. Later, to make sure the audience gets the point, they glowingly call each other “rockstar” before finally head home.
But later that week Craig becomes a liability to Austin. At a party on Friday evening with the buddies, Austin breaks out his boxing gear and Craig knocks him down. Realising his social blunder, Craig shoves a bar of soap into his mouth and starts pitifully punishing himself in front of the group: “I’m a bad boy. What did I do? I’m such a bad boy. I’m sorry, I’m really sorry.” Austin decides to drop Craig, “I don’t want to continue this friendship,” he says, and then the stalking begins. First, Craig appears on the television-news set, “Are you wearing makeup? I won’t tell your wife!” Next, we move to a creepy scene—whose purpose will be made clear later—where Craig appears to be hitting on an eighteen-year-old mobile-phone salesman, inviting him to get drunk at a local bar. Then he takes his sixteen-year-old son to the mall and asks him about his romantic relationships before reverting back into the clumsy: “This is fun. Hanging out at the mall is fun,” he says, after which the son yanks his phone out of his pocket and practically runs down the nearest escalator to escape.
The filmmakers ingeniously use a set of stairs between Craig’s front door and the main reception level to position the camera at floor level—allowing multiple shots of Craig returning home from the perspective of his wife (Tami, played by Kate Mara). This emphasises Craig’s sheer oddity, wearing a yellow tie over a white shirt several sizes too big and a thick outer puffer jacket. There are some great shots of the shock of the buddies in the soap scene, and the reactions of the friends at a welcome home party for Tami after she is found.
Many people consider “The Social Network” (2010) to be Jesse Eisenberg’s best role to date. He plays Facebook-founder Mark Zuckerberg—surely the uber-geek—who is being sued by an ex-business partner, played by equally well-cast Andrew Garfield, and a pair of twins. (Eventually the ex-partner’s house is mysteriously burned to the ground.) Both in film, then, and in the public imagination the geeky technology whizz is part of a well known—and very wealthy—social class (they even have their own widely used collective noun: tech bros). The boxing scene, which Craig had to win, reminded me of Mr Zuckerberg’s recent enthusiasm for body building and interest in cage fighting. It’s both masculine and aggressive, certainly not funny or light entertainment. Comedy could fruitfully shine the spotlight on the dangers of a group of similar white men amassing god-like powers; but “Friendship” just ducks the subject entirely. That’s a pity.
But the more significant, potentially fatal, problem with films about bros is their inbuilt tendency to reduce the roles of the women to cameos, or even worse to meek, dutiful wives. Tami runs a successful floral business from home but too often the men do the talking for her. And of course she is dippy enough to get lost. Meanwhile, at one point Austin’s wife asks her husband to answer the front door for her, as she is nervous about a burglary (her role is very much a cameo—she has few other lines). The best word to describe the humour overall is podcasty, in the format of a conversation between two relatively well-to-do suburban straight white men sharing inside jokes. And what they considered “cool” is—predictably enough—drinking beer, sports cars, playing in a band and breaking rules. Each to their own. This style of filmmaking brings about a final product overstuffed with mindless swearing at every point—thus the 15-rating—with a good amount of brass-necked product promotion to boot. (The scene involving a sandwich chain is quite absurd.)
Still, when I attended, the audience seemed appreciative and there were a lot of laughs. Towards the end, fed up with all the bickering, Craig makes what I thought a well-founded observation: “This is why guys shouldn’t have friends. It will get you into a ton of trouble!” he says.
Adam Poole 26th July 2025
If you are interested in viewing this screening, please book your tickets here
