Pitches Be Crazy

Year: 2017

Director: Trish Sie

Cast: Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson, Brittany Snow

Run Time: 1 hour 33 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG-13

The Pitch Perfect franchise has a pretty personal connection to me. The first one arrived when I was a freshman in college, the same as the characters in the movie. And just like how I grew up at roughly the same rate as Harry Potter, I grew along with the Garden Bellas, through college and into the vaguely defined post-graduation future. These movies have followed every beat of my life since 2012, arriving every couple of years to remind me of the pop songs I tried to ignore while the years were passing. So I knew I had to check out the third and ostensibly final entry in the franchise, despite the fact that I borderline hated the previous entry. Let's see how it went!

Ah, I see they're traveling to Europe! That's always a good sign, right?

Pitch Perfect 3 cuts the fat of the franchise's cast, slicing off pretty much every male character and even one of the Barden Bellas (sorry Stacie, I don't know if you were actually pregnant or just busy, but at least you get a scene over FaceTime - Skylar Astin is stuck prepping for the Trolls TV series and he got squat) as the now graduated Bellas return for one final adventure. They are all struggling with finding their place in the larger world, so they're throwing their all into a USO tour, hoping that they can get noticed over the other bands and picked to open for a cameo-ing DJ Khaled on his big televised show at the end of the week.

The plot is mostly just DJ Khaled straining for laughs, shooting his bizarre personality in every direction possible, but let's break it down a little more. Beca (Anna Kendrick) just quit her job as a corporate music producer, but when she meets Khaled's manager Theo (Guy Burnet) she realizes she might not have lost her interest in that lifestyle. Fat Amy (Rebel Wilson) encounters her mafioso father (John Lithgow sporting a terrible Aussie accent), who tries to charm her back into his life for potentially nefarious reasons. And, um... Chloe (Brittany Snow) flirts with hot Army dude Chicago (Matt Lanter). I guess there's other girls too (Anna Camp, Ester Dean, Hailee Steinfeld, Hana Mae Lee, and poor Chrissie Fit - who was saddled with the worst character in PP2 and as a reward for her patience gets absolutely nothing to do here).

The biggest issue is that the bands they're competing with use actual instruments and claim not to perform covers (that's a big part of the way they judge the Bellas, but if there's a original song in the lineup we eventually see, I'll eat my f**king hat).

Nice try, Josie and the Pussycats.

Now, it's not entirely Pitch Perfect 3's fault that its songs are boring as hell. Sia is very popular at the moment (plus, she has a tie with the first film's use of the song "Titanium"), so it makes sense that they chose to perform "Cheap Thrills." Unfortunately, that song has the tempo of a funeral dirge and does not befit itself to a high energy comedy sequel. It feels like the movie has been thrust into slow motion, and the other songs don't do much to bring the pace back up. 

Among the artists selected to be brought to tedious life without instrumentation are Flo Rida, George Michael, some unbearably hip songbird called Daya, and oh... that's about it. It just all seems hopelessly random and listless, and only Britney Spears' "Toxic" does anything to pique the interest (they clearly know this because the performance is repeated twice, in the opening and about an hour later). There's not even any mash-upping happening here, which is the only trick the Bellas have in their bag! The only thing that got me through the second movie was the a cappella performances, and this film lacks a major lifeline.

At least they didn't force us to listen to any more Hailee Steinfeld-penned original song catastrophes.

I've never liked the recurring Pitch Perfect joke of slapping the prefix "aca-" in front of random words. It's not really a joke, and it's one of the writers' favorite things to shove in there when a scene is flagging. Of course, this entry is more than ready to double down on all the gags people purportedly respond to from the franchise, so I don't get off easy in the comedy department either.

Luckily, the cast is still charming (and quite comfortable in their characters' skins at this point) and manages to deliver some fun, punchy material from the midst of this messy, scattered plot. They're clearly having fun together, and that does spice up some of the potentially leaden moments. But there's no doubting that the whole affair is being held together with bubblegum and twine.

Just like the Ghostbusters remake before it, the end credits reveal just how many scenes were cut to shreds, shoving in outtakes left and right that are very clearly entire scenes that wound up on the cutting room floor. And the film is so uninvested in actual character growth, some of these scenes actually provide vital exposition that should have actually been doled out to us 80 minutes before.

I will say this: Pitch Perfect 3 does know how preposterous it is, and it does lean in with some semi-charming meta jokes and an actually enjoyable sense of total reckless abandon. This is best exemplified in this film's Riff-Off, in which people who clearly have no right knowing how a cappella works conspicuously burst into song, to the chagrin of the Bellas. That doesn't make it a good film, but sometimes it's a sort of enjoyable one.

Better than Part 2? That's a low bar to clear, but I honestly don't think it can claim that title. These sequels have indulged in the worst impulses of the original, which was an incredible comedy in spite of certain flaws. Now these films have buffed out everything but the flaws, and this is a well I hope they don't return to until they've had a long time to think about what they did.

TL;DR: Pitch Perfect 3 is a scattered, tedious sequel that doesn't do right by its characters, its story, or - most importantly - its music.

Rating: 5/10

Word Count: 1072

Reviews In This Series

Pitch Perfect 2 (Banks, 2015)

Pitch Perfect 3 (Sie, 2017)

How To Succeed In Valentine's Day Box Office (Without Really Trying)

Year: 2016
Director: Christian Ditter
Cast: Dakota Johnson, Rebel Wilson, Leslie Mann
Run Time: 1 hour 50 minutes
MPAA Rating: R

The odds are looking increasingly likely that I’m an idiot. Exhibit A: I watched How to be Single on purpose. To be fair, I had my doubts about its overlong mishmash of a trailer, but one joke in particular really sold me (Of course it’s not in the final cut. Of course.) Plus, in last year’s Valentine smash Fifty Shades of Grey, lead actress Dakota Johnson proved surprisingly adept at wringing intentional laughs from her performance. I was more than pleased that she was given a shot at an actual comedy film and wanted to see how it panned out.

All I can say is that it’s definitely not her fault the movie sucks.

In the grand tradition of classic ensemble comedies like Valentine’s Day and New Year’s Eve, How to be Single follows the stories of four single women in New York City. Only three of them actually seem to be connected in any meaningful way and only three of them (a different set, naturally) actually get solo scenes, but at least Ashton Kutcher isn’t hanging around. Our de facto lead is Alice (Dakota Johnson), who is taking a break from her college sweetheart Josh (Nicholas Braun) to discover who she really is on her own. At her Big City paralegal job that she never really goes to, she meets Robin (Rebel Wilson), a firecracker-about-town who urges her to embrace singlehood and collect dicks like they’re Pokémon cards.

We also, for some reason, follow Alice’s considerably older/ginger sister Meg (Leslie Mann, and the truly staggering difference between their ages might explain why there is exactly zero parental presence in the film), who is an OB-GYN that (gasp) doesn’t want children! The horror! Of course, after about three minutes of thought, she reverses forty years of steadfast philosophy and decides she actually does want kids. Women, am I right? Can’t live with ‘em, can’t write ‘em as well-rounded, independent characters. She decides to get pregnant with a sperm donor, which gets complicated when she falls for the much-younger Ken (Obvious Child’s Jake Lacy), who has been pursuing her like a hawk on Adderall.

And then there’s Lucy (Alison Brie) who lives above a bar owned by Tom (Anders Holm) and uses his WiFi. Other than the fact that the other ladies know Tom and have existed in this same bar before, she is completely unrelated. She launches a neurotic, algorithmic hunt for The One via online dating sites while the consummate bachelor Tom struggles with his inexplicable feelings for her.

Apparently, how to be single is to be in a relationship, which seems off message.

How to be Single lauds itself as a genre-defying romantic comedy, telling the stories you don’t typically hear on Valentine’s Day and busting tropes left and right. To be fair, there are a decent amount of clichés that are subverted, but they’re all jammed into the final 20 minutes when the filmmakers remembered that some time long before the putrid stretch of Hell that was the production of How to be Single, there was actually a point to all of this. But the tropes they focus on are merely superficial ones, like overused lines or certain visual clues, and fairly ineptly presented ones at that. They totally ignore the egregious cacophony of overused tripe that comprises their own script. Their satire is like popping a pimple when they really should be addressing the flesh-eating bacteria

Because boy, is HtbS full of rankling rom-com idiocies. In fact, it relies almost exclusively on them to make the severely disjointed plot in any way comprehensible. Never mind the fact that only a romantic comedy would make such a f**king John Philip Sousa ticker tape big deal out of being single, or that its central philosophy requires a strict, black-and-white view on relationships that only rarely resembles reality. That just comes with the territory. No, we’re talking huge Deep Impact clichés that slam the audience so hard their fillings rattle.

Let’s list off a couple of the hyperbolically frustrating tropes present in How to be Single and see if you get a Bad Rom-Com Bingo:

• Pregnant women are hormonal, crazed monsters that will literally eat you if you look at them wrong.
• Casual sex is a Huge Mistake, even when it’s between two consenting adults with a previous sexual history and clearly stated intentions not to be together long-term.
• Tom is so devoted to being single that he has developed a relationship-repelling system. He rivals even Barney Stinson in being an actual psychopath, depriving them of food and water until they find a way to escape his Bachelor’s Lair.
• Alice is such a helpless infant that she can’t figure out how to use her TV remote (it’s 2016, just Google it) and takes an entire film to discover that she can sleep in the middle of the bed.
• Everything is neatly wrapped up with a sitcommy closing narration.
• The only black woman in the film is a store patron who sassily shouts “Get it, girl!” from offscreen.
• All of this culminates in a spot of drama so manufactured, it wouldn’t make it past the rough draft of a soap opera episode.

With these amateurs wielding such powerful clichés, it’s no small wonder they didn’t destroy several careers in the process.

In short, HtbS is even more generic than the conventions it’s attempting to subvert. But honestly, that’s just one twig on the raging bonfire of incompetence. The film cuts between the three major storylines at a machine gun pace, leaving the viewer to piece each shattered fragment of a plot together like Humpty Dumpty, a truly mystifying preponderance of handheld camerawork gives the impression that the cinematographer is either doing jumping jacks or constantly on the verge of passing out from boredom, and the parade of Top 40 hits masquerading as a “soundtrack” frequently drowns out the actual dialogue. Oh, and how could I forget the editing so sloppy that it gives us two St. Patrick’s Days in a row? A movie is bad enough if it has one! It’s an unholy mess, scatterbrained and inept.

However… (I am beyond pleased to be using this word, if only to salvage what remains of my psyche) How to be Single isn’t a 100% guaranteed waste of time. I would never recommend that anyone actually sit down to watch it, but there are a solid set of performances that swoop in to save the day. First off, Dakota Johnson really does prove herself here as a reliable comic actress. She isn’t asked to do much more than clammily stammer at reasonably attractive men, but she anchors her role with an engaging charm ands some truly impeccable line readings.

She’s by far the standout, although everybody involved actually does give it a shot. Jake Lacy is sweet and kooky, Leslie Mann and Alison Brie are sufficient to the point that their characters don’t tip over when they’re speaking, and Rebel Wilson just keeps on trucking with her faithful schtick, though her presence is extravagantly pointless.

How to be Single is the That Awkward Moment of 2016: A subpar, plotless vehicle that features a surprisingly solid cast, and which makes an honestly and nearly successful attempt at redeeming the torpid material.

TL;DR: How to be Single is a choppy, scatterbrained mess that at least is supported by a solid female cast.
Rating: 4/10
Word Count: 1251

The Pitch Is Back

Year: 2015

Director: Elizabeth Banks

Cast: Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson, Hailee Steinfeld

Run Time: 1 hour 55 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG-13

Pitch Perfect is an important franchise for me. When the original film opened in 2012, I was a dewy-eyed and apple-cheeked freshman out in the world for the first time. The lively and unexpectedly fresh college comedy was the perfect match for my budding lust for life. Now, the years have passed by and as I face graduation and the rest of my life, Pitch Perfect 2 has arrived to once again mirror my situation.

Just like me, it's a little more tired and a little less sure of itself, but equally eager to please.

And in a slightly more precarious position.

Pitch Perfect picks up three years after the original, with the newcomer Beca (Anna Kendrick) having risen to the lucrative position of leader of the Barden Bellas, the Barden Academy's all-female a cappella team. After Fat Amy (Rebel Wilson) suffers an unfortunate wardrobe malfunction at a presidential gala, the Bellas are suspended from competition because screenwriter Kay Cannon would rather stick her hand in a meat grinder than see a fat woman naked.

Anyway, the one shot the Bellas have to regain their official standing is to win the World's A Capella Competition, to which they have a free pass, being the reigning U.S. champions. However, to accomplish this and beat their German Rivals, Das Sound Machine, they must struggle to rediscover their identity and find their sound, a conflict which also defines Beca's increasingly stressful workload at her secret internship at a music studio. As she suffers from the strain of splitting her focus, the newcomer/legacy student/songwriter/character we introduce so we can have another sequel once we lose Anna Kendrick, Emily (Hailee Steinfeld), feels neglected. Boo hoo.

At least she gets lines. That's more than you can say for about half of the filler Bellas this time around.

Pitch Perfect 2 is a very complicated movie to like. While it was never going to be able to capture the lightning in a bottle of the first film, it does have moments that at least touch the glass. But these scenes, no matter how relatively frequent they may be, can't satisfactorily break through the haze of the film's stupefyingly distasteful humor.

The script's disdain for overweight women was admittedly present in the original film, albeit handled with more grace, but several series mainstays are turned into shrieking harpies of bigotry and new character Flo (Chrissie Fit) is seemingly culled from a first draft of a Song of the South-era Disney film about illegal immigrants. It's bad enough that the "Mexican but Actually Guatemalan" character is treated the way she is by others, but when her every line consists of references to third world diseases, wayward kidnappings, and drug barons, perhaps it's time to rethink your "female empowerment and inclusion" credo.

Add in the wildly overused commentator John (John Michael Higgins) whose "cantankerous old man with 50's values" character is a dead horse that is not only beaten but encased in concrete and sunk into the Hudson, as well as Cynthia Rose (Ester Dean), a once proud lesbian character who has been reduced to a predatory womanizer that sexually harasses her friends because she's so butch and can't control her lady bits, and you have a film that's immensely unpleasant to watch.

About as unpleasant as pillow fights. Have you ever actually had one? Overrated.

Pitch Perfect 2 is essentially an advanced exercise in character assassination, but several manage to survive the carnage. Anna Kendrick returns, as strong as ever, brimming with unforced charm, and her chemistry with the equally committed Rebel Wilson is the strongest returning element. Newcomers David Cross (as a deeply weird a cappella superfan) and Keegan-Michael Key (as Beca's unspeakably self-assured boss) also survive the fray with hardly a scratch, breathing life into the waterlogged lungs of whatever scenes they appear in.

And honestly, some moments are just damn funny, no two ways about it. From the revolving door of guest stars you never knew you wanted to the gags that subvert chick flick clichés with unparalleled ease, there's a lot to really enjoy in Pitch Perfect 2. 

Unfortunately, the music really isn't as strong this time around, though the song choices are intermittently exciting. The Riff-Off 2.0 is exceptionally disorganized, and a mid-film medley is a glaring mistake, though there are a decent amount of well-heeled production numbers, especially from the slickly precise Das Sound Machine. 

Probably the most flawed performances occur during the Bellas' "Find Our Voice" period. They're supposed to be terrible for narrative purposes, but the producers are keenly aware that they still need to sell singles. As a result, many of these tracks occupy a strange middle space between soullessly generic and halfheartedly creative.

Kind of like Ariana Grande.

And the addition of an original song co-penned by Sia and Sam Smith (with all of the droning, syrupy lyricism that that phrase implies) plants the film securely in an insipid post-Glee territory for far longer than it needs to.

But in spite of its impressive slate of flaws, Pitch Perfect 2 is still lovable.

Kind of like Ariana Grande.

It's a mostly endearing comedy with a hard-won moral about finding yourself post-graduation, and it ain't gonna kill ya. 

TL;DR: Pitch Perfect 2 occupies a dangerous zone in terms of offensive humor and leaden song choices, but is genuinely fun a good portion of the time.
Rating: 6/10
Should I Spend Money On This? If you were a fan of the original, absolutely.
Word Count: 940
Reviews In This Series
Pitch Perfect 2 (Banks, 2015)
Pitch Perfect 3 (Sie, 2017)