Trainwreck opened this past weekend, finishing third at the box office, and I can’t remember the last time I was as excited to see a movie.
But after watching it, I felt very confused. Kind of like when you are SUPER pumped for a first date and your friend brings, like, 12 dresses to your apartment so you can decide what to wear. Then during the date, you can tell this dude would literally rather be anywhere else and at the end of the night you’re left wondering what happened. That is how I felt after watching Trainwreck.
I’m going to be honest here — I fell asleep for a very brief portion of this movie, closer to the beginning, because it started out slow and awful and I was like, what the fuck is even happening here. Amy Schumer is hilarious — there is ample evidence of this. But so many jokes fall flat here and the story lacks a lot of cohesion. I couldn’t love Bill Hader more — ever since Forgetting Sarah Marshall — yet even he couldn’t redeem most of this movie.
Schumer plays a commitment-phobic writer, Amy, who is rarely sober and plows through a lot of different guys. Hader plays Aaron, the sports doctor she is assigned to cover. There is a scene where she is watching him operate on an athlete’s knee and she throws up. I only mention this as an excuse to tell you that they used the fakest looking leg I have ever seen.
They start dating and it appears to be smooth sailing. You’re supposed to recognize a level of discomfort on Amy’s side because she doesn’t do relationships, but it’s really lacking in the sense that it comes and goes whenever it pleases. It’s weird to watch her be so comfortable and uncomfortable with the same person. And I suppose that does exist in some ways in real relationships, but watching it on screen gave me a major case of side-eye. Like, how can this person who is so terrified to commit to anyone all of a sudden just do it? Is it really that easy?
Aaron is Amy’s opposite in many ways. During an argument, he says to her, “I’ve had sex with three women,” and without hesitation she responds, “So have I.” They are eventually faced with a death that brings out a lot of tension, both in their relationship and issues that Amy has with her family. She eventually gets fired. As is typical in the rom-com genre, someone has to hit rock bottom before they can have their happy ending. (Or maybe this is just specific to Judd Apatow, but I feel like most rom-coms have this issue.)
Speaking of the ending, it truly is the best part of Trainwreck. Not just because the movie was over, but because the obligatory grand gesture is epic. In my overzealous excitement about this movie, I committed to seeing it opening night and then again next week. So maybe if I’m less tired, I’ll like it more the second time around. But if not, hey, at least I have the ending.