Office Christmas Party (2016) Review!!!

Synopsis – When his uptight CEO sister threatens to shut down his branch, the branch manager throws an epic Christmas party in order to land a big client and save the day, but the party gets way out of hand.

My Take – Now that the year is ending, we are getting into the busier period of holiday parties. We have our family parties, friend’s parties, and even the parties that happen at shopping malls that you probably see for the Christmas-like atmosphere. But I’m pretty sure that everyone has had experience with at least one office party of some sort. It might be just a plate of cupcakes your boss brought in, or perhaps they sprang for something bigger and had an actual party with music and holiday cheer. The last holiday office party was years back & things didn’t go down too well, if you know what I mean. Coming to films, I feel like this has not been a good year for comedy, while passable films such as Central Intelligence, Bad Moms & Ride Along 2 have done reasonable well, deserving films such Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising, Sausage Party & The Nice Guys were shoved into the corner, but like every year, we haven’t got that one big crazy film yet. Following an annual Hollywood tradition of every holiday season, this year too we get to see a big Christmas comedy, from directing duo Josh Gordon and Will Speck (The Switch, Blades of Glory), with an ensemble cast, in the hopes of producing a new holiday cult classic that will catch on in the way that comedies like National Lampoon’s Vacation or Bad Santa have over the years, while aiming to capture a mix festive silliness and R-rated raunchiness. The end result – an enjoyable film to watch which exhibits the expected vulgar humor and idiosyncratic characters required to spice things up and create amusement. This film is something that you can’t take too seriously as a piece of a cinema and just accepts it as a light- hearted, sex and drug-infused Christmas comedy isn’t exactly too focused on interesting plot and what it is focused on is good comedy. As always though, comedy is a sensitive topic and everyone has their type they enjoy. Personally, I try to keep an open mind to it and this was definitely my kind of comedy. I’m always wary of comedy movies now these days as most of the recent ones I’ve seen this year weren’t the best or made me laugh out loud (maybe a giggle or two but that’s basically it like the terrible Mike and Dave). The story follows Clay Vanstone (T.J. Miller), manager of the original branch of national technology company Zenotech, whose branch has been struggling to pull its weight and his joyless and mean-spirited sister, Carol (Jennifer Aniston), the CEO of Zenotech (since Clay and Carol’s father died) is threatening to close down the branch – or at least put a big lump of coal in the stockings of many of its employees. Hence, it’s up to Clay, Josh Parker (Jason Bateman), his Chief Technical Officer and best friend, who have to try and figure out a way to save the branch. Which comes in the form of Josh’s assistant, Tracey (Olivia Munn), who thinks has an innovation idea that could do the trick, but Josh thinks that her idea isn’t ready to demonstrate. Instead, the three of them focus on the strategy of winning the business of prospective client Walter Davis (Courtney B. Vance).

Clay, Josh and Tracey decide to show Walter that they are the kind of people he wants to deal with, by inviting him to their office Christmas party – and making it the finest office party ever, despite Carol stating otherwise. As they’re about the business of pulling together the party of the century in five hours and making it into the most fun their colleagues have ever had with their clothes on (for those who keep them on, that is), several of the people of Zenotech have their own individual struggles to deal with. Besides their business rivalry, there’s a deep-seated sibling rivalry between Clay and Carol. Josh is newly divorced and is starting to make eyes at Tracey. Meanwhile, a nerdy employee named Nate (Karan Soni) keeps talking about a girlfriend whom others believe he has made up, while an employee named Allison (Vanessa Bayer) and another named Fred (Randall Park) are flirting with each other and a human resources representative named Mary Winetoss (Kate McKinnon) is zealously monitoring the behavior of all her co-workers. Nonetheless, and true to form, things get out of control and that objective and peaceful celebration will turn into a truly tremendous event of drugs, alcohol, and sex. To give credit where credit’s due, the film does deliver on its premise, by clearly trying to be within the same “naughty” Christmas film genre like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation or Bad Santa. To its credit, a film centered on this is a pretty good idea. There are a lot of shenanigans that are over the top and even a couple of funny moments from the cast. This is indeed a film about an office Christmas party where debauchery goes hand in hand with yuletide merriment. Those looking for anything beyond the large, drawn out set piece featured in the trailer (i.e. the party) will be sorely disappointed. Yet given what’s in the trailer, if you’re clutching your pearls throughout, it really is on you for assuming there’d be anything more than broad low-hanging jokes and extended moments of improvisation. The story can be described as a mash-up of “Unfinished Business” (2015), “Project X” (2012), “Horrible Bosses” (2011), “Billy Madison” (1995) and “Die Hard”. The script was conceived by six people—a very unusual number in this type of movies—: Justin Malen, Laura Solon, and Dan Mazer are responsible for creating the dialog of the characters while Jon Lucas, Scott Moore, and Timothy Dowling are who sketched the story in general. They employ modern technologies as the drive motor in the story, even so, setting cardinal purpose of Christmas aside. What makes this film a bit different is that it’s not the customary teens or college crowds at the center of the storm. It’s certainly an improvement over the recent entries peppered with vulgar jokes and colorful language. There’s a little restraint here, and much of the fun is focused on the lack of inhibition which takes over the office workers. There are flashes and hints of inappropriate behavior, but the jokes are about how tragic some of the characters’ situations are, and the pathetic ways in which try to get out of the hole. There are some genuinely funny moments which appear to originate from the minds of geeks. We see a GOT throne in the middle of the party, and the one drug related joke is an accident that triggers unexpected reactions in the Davis character. Yes, we have a pimp in the mix, but she’s a little unhinged and funnier than usual. The security woman might be a stereotype, but she’s definitely has personality. The strait-laced human resource lady plays her character so well that we can’t help laugh out loud at some of her remarks, and most of the one-liners are personality quirks references, it’s a bit raunchy, but it does have a heart and a little bit of brain. Something sad is that film’s objective was to achieve keeping the company on feet and not enjoy a traditional Christmas period, although, as I said, Christmas is a simple wrapping. The screenplay also presents a social and labor comment in the treatment of its characters, although the unreal plot doesn’t fit into a sensible and realistic mind, it can design quite common roles in working life.

The aspect of the film that impressed me was the creativity. It was great to see a Christmas film that cleverly integrated a celebration that is embraced by ample companies across the world and turn it into a horrible disaster. With regard to lines of the dialog of the actors, you can see that they manage to generate—why not—guffaws with influence of pop culture, however, it does not armor itself from using the narrative comedian clichés of the genre. That imperfection in screenplay is fortuitously compensated with the real employees. This film has a little something for everyone including crude genitalia jokes, one liners, slapstick comedy, and bathroom humor. Our Hollywood writers continue to put out incredibly stupid lines that we eat up, but managed to time it very well to keep the laughs going. Fans of TJ Miller and Kate McKinnon will get their fill of awkward rants, screaming dialogue, and ridiculous faces associated with the dialogue. Those who want a little more cleverness behind their comedy will also get their wish, for the office is packing a few puns and pokes geared towards the holiday season. These moments, as well as a few fart jokes, were my favorite, primarily seeing Jennifer Aniston whip out some angry moves on some extreme extras. Yet what’s a comedy without a little music to amp the stupidity up? The film has you covered here too, with a list of tracks to keep your feet moving in the aisles. Hilarious raps mirror the theme of the scenes, while upbeat techno songs pave the way for high speed chases and epic party montages. It fit well with the overall theme of the movie, and having a character DJ bump most of them was another example of creativity. And surprisingly the comedy has some character development that extended past a character getting laid or getting an ideal job. The biggest drawback to the film is that while the plot plays into the film a lot, its paper thin. That’s typical of this type of genre; the problem with this specific film is that there are too many subplots added on top of it. Some of them are funnier than others but the time that is split between them isn’t managed well and it screws with flow of the movie. Other smaller drawbacks include the fact the film could have been trimmed down a little bit (cutting some of the unnecessary subplots might have helped) and the film also tries to wrap up everything in a neat little bow at the end. It also tries to tug on the heart strings and give some of the characters some more development. While it’s nice they tried, the overall tone of the rest of the film doesn’t mesh with it. The huge ensemble of actors plays their parts quite well. Jennifer Aniston is also solid, playing the ruthless, sassy CEO, Carol. Aniston‘s one mission for the past 12 years has been to prove that she’s not just Rachel Green and she’s done it several times successfully and this is one of them. Her comedic timing has greatly improved and she delivers her insults so coldly that I had to put a jacket on. Fresh off her Emmy win and launch into super-mainstream popularity, Kate McKinnon delivers a hilarious performance as by-the-books HR worker, Mary, who embodies a Luna Lovegood-esque airiness about her and a layer of mystery that makes you wish she was the central character. This just proves that Kate McKinnon might just be the next Fey/Poehler to come from SNL into Hollywood movies. That said, the real MVP here is obviously T.J. Miller who creates more giggles in a harebrained mirror pep talk than most comedians hope to have over a night. Courtney B. Vance was pretty great after abandoning the straight-man role earlier in the film. Jason Bateman is playing Jason Bateman from every other film, playing the by the books nice guy. Olivia Munn is also impressive here. The supporting cast comprising of Rob Corddry, Karan Soni, Jamie Chung, Sam Richardson, Vanessa Bayer, Jillian Bell, Abbey Lee and Randall Park do an incredible amount of heavy lifting, keeping the film afloat with enough fun energy and pleasant moments to keep the audience from thinking about the thin plot and instances of implausibility. On the whole, ‘Office Christmas Party’ delivers on being a mindless laugh fest meant to brighten your holidays with plenty of wit, comedy and chemistry. Just don’t expect anything too revolutionary or unique in the film.