The Boss (2016) Review!!!

Synopsis – A titan of industry is sent to prison after she’s caught insider trading. When she emerges ready to rebrand herself as America’s latest sweetheart, not everyone she screwed over is so quick to forgive and forget.

My Take – Let me start by saying I have never been Melissa McCarthy fan. Sure, I liked her in some movies like the Bridesmaids as well last years hilarious Spy, but somehow I think her physical comedy at times gets really off putting. Here, she teams again, after the disastrous Tammy, with Ben Falcone, McCarthy‘s husband and longtime collaborator for a film written by both and produced by Adam Mckay (The Big Short, Anchorman films) & Will Ferrell‘s Gary Sanchez Productions. This production house has dished out some really good comedies in the past. But of late it seems to have lost steam, their latest Daddy’s Home (2015) was rather a decent watch. But this one is a completely bland affair – one of those hit and run films production houses mass produce in off-season, just to keep their people employed. Agreed, Melissa McCarthy is a successful comedic actress. Her films make a ton of money and she’s been nominated for an Oscar. I’m happy for the girl but in my opinion, she hasn’t been humorous in a movie since 2011’s Bridesmaids (of which she got said Oscar nom) and to some extend the successful Spy (but credit for that goes to Paul Feig‘s writing and Jason Statham‘s show stealing performance). Melissa has become the female Vince Vaughn being that she plays the same character type and bemoans the same tired mannerisms in all of her projects. She has also become the female Chris Farley. The only difference is that her aptitude of physical comedy doesn’t have any payoffs or a means to an end. When McCarthy falls down the stairs in this film, it’s not justified and it feels like it was never supposed to happen. When she lays down on a fold out bed and it hurls her against a wall, it doesn’t register as plausible.

All these shenanigans are done to force a laugh out of you. The story follows Michelle Darnell (Melissa McCarthy), a high-powered businesswoman and motivational speaker whose childhood (back and forth between an orphanage and foster care) taught her that the only person she can depend on is herself. She’s self-centered, arrogant and basically amoral. She cares little for anyone, even her never sleeping assistant Clair Rawlins (Kristen Bell). One day, Michelle’s business enemy, and former lover, a Japanese culture loving Renault (Peter Dinklage), exposes her insider trading, which puts her in prison for five months, along with her property seized by the government and her bank accounts frozen, putting her back at square one. With no place to go and no one willing to work with her, she shows up at the front door of Claire, who lives with her young daughter Rachel, and has taken a new job. She lets Michelle stay with them, but forces her to help out, including taking Rachel to her scouting meeting. It’s here where she discovers that the girl’s troop sells a high amount of cookies. It’s here where she’s inspired to make a brand new scouting troop that sells brownies that are cooked by Claire and twenty percent of the profits go back to the girls. The story here is completely predictable. The clichéd plot lazily recycles the often used story of a main character who has been hardened by a tough life and doesn’t know how to give or receive love. There are portions of raw physical comedy too. Falcone‘s direction randomly makes use of McCarthy‘s talent for physical comedy, but rarely gets her or the other actors to show us anything interesting or even very likable about their characters. Both the script and the acting give us characters who often change their tones and their attitudes toward other characters abruptly and with no clear reason why. The humor is of poorly calibrated slapstick category. We also see characters meeting for the first time, but acting like they already know each other, again without explanation.There is also a lack of realism in the way the script portrays the fallout from Michelle’s crimes, and her business dealings as the head of Darnell’s Darlings, but this comedy’s biggest flaw is its lack of comedy. There are a few laughs to be found here and there, but the movie’s other problems just kill the mood. Besides that, the movie’s attempts at humor are overly dependent on cartoonish violence involving children, cursing around, by and at children, and vulgar sexual references which come off as more crude than funny.

You literally stop laughing after a limit! This flick is supposed to be about the trading of securities, entrepreneurship, and the emergence of a self-made woman. However, the interplay between the troupers came off as though no one did any research on these subjects. During the film with its twisted innuendos, its sense of cringing fantasy, and its morbid sense of hilarity, I had no idea what McCarthy‘s Darnell did for a living, no idea what kind of job Kristin Bell‘s Claire had, and no idea how Peter Dinklage‘s antagonistic Renault became so rich. What we’re left with as an audience, is improvised not to mention grating dialogue from mediocre actors (McCarthy for the moment, is excluded and Bell could do better than this thankless role). I mean was there no one on set to consult Falcone, McCarthy, or Mallory on the ins and outs of CEO compartmentalization (or anything Martha Stewart went through)? Guess not. The opening sequence in the film has Melissa‘s Michelle Darnell making an appearance at Chicago’s famed, United Center. She comes down on a phoenix and basically says, “I’m the wealthiest woman in America” and “do you wanna make some f**cking money!” Heck, a second grader with a ‘C’ average could have written those lines. In the spirit of exaggeration in lieu of creativity, three scenes in particular stand out: the street fight between rival scout troops, a ridiculous breast grope-off with McCarthy and Bell, and a clumsily staged sword fight between McCarthy and Dinklage. The missed opportunity to have a point about girls in business, and stooping to schmaltz with the Michelle family story are every bit as disappointing as the mostly unfunny and constant use of profanity-laced insults. Making an R rated movie around something that’s supposed to be child friendly is a extremely tough sell and this movie justifies why something like this one shouldn’t be pursued without an intelligent script. As is, I laughed a few times, but mostly by how insane McCarthy can be with her character. Both Kristen Bell and Peter Dinklage try their best, but the material gives them little to work with, and their stuck telling predictable jokes with a predictable story. Even Tyler Labine and Kathy Bates are wasted. On the whole, ‘The Boss’ is mildly funny in parts, but is a wholly predictable, disappointing and scattershot comedic wreck that you probably will never remember.