Quick Synopsis: A married couple go to a remote cabin, both with plans to kill each other.
I like Samara Weaving. She’s developed a real reputation as a scream queen, but a very versatile one: being able to be both a villain and a final girl. It makes sense for her to be in this film. Jason Segel? Not so much. Best known for comedies such as Forgetting Sarah Marshall, The Muppets, and HIMYM. The closest he’s got to something like this would be his bit part in Dead Man On Campus. He’s not someone you’d think about if you were casting this. That’s why it works. You expect him to play his usual role of “sad dog turned into sad human, with occasional bursts of excitement”, so when we see that he’s planned this holiday to kill his wife, it’s a genuine shock (unless you’ve read the synopsis or seen a trailer). The two have weirdly good chemistry. They make sense as a couple with the way they interact with each other, albeit a strained couple; both waiting for the other one to be the first one to instigate intimacy. It helps that they both take this film seriously; they’re not looking for laughs, mugging for the camera, and that’s what makes it funny.
As for the film itself. I’m slightly disappointed by it, but only because Jorma Taccone also directed MacGruber and Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping, and I love both of those movies. This is tonally different, and not quite as entertaining. That doesn’t mean it’s not good. It’s absolutely hilarious at times, not just the dialogue, but also the violence. The violence never feels cruel or gratuitous. The gore could be slightly better, looking slightly cheap and fake at times, but it kind of works. Over Your Dead Body (OYDB, pronounced Oi Deb!) knows that it is ridiculous. It doesn’t try to turn the relationship into some deeply serious examination of a marriage falling apart. Instead, it takes the petty frustrations and resentments between the two characters and pushes them to their most extreme conclusion. Every argument, awkward interaction and moment of suspicion has the potential to become a matter of life and death. The plot is pure farce, but OYDB is careful not to make it silly to the point of parody. The characters take the situation very seriously, so the threat feels real. So when the characters do slightly humorous things, it’s funnier because we buy into them as people.
The villains are probably where the film’s balancing act works best. They’re not just generic obstacles for Dan and Lisa to overcome; they all have their own personalities and quirks, which makes them feel like actual people rather than characters who exist solely to move the plot along. I’m not too familiar with Keith Jardine, but he’s a lot of fun here, bringing exactly the sort of physical presence you’d expect from someone with a history of getting paid for punching people in the face, while also showing a surprising amount of vulnerability. He’s basically a more vocal Lurch from Hot Fuzz (the “yar” guy). Timothy Olyphant continues to be Hollywood’s secret weapon, seemingly incapable of being anything other than entertaining even when he’s playing a relatively straight role. And it’s nice to see Juliette Lewis transition from hostage in From Dusk Till Dawn to hostage taker here.
I think that’s ultimately why I enjoyed OYDB more than I expected to, despite the slight disappointment. It isn’t as relentlessly funny as MacGruber or Popstar, and I don’t think it’s going to replace either of those in my list of favourite Jorma Taccone films. But it doesn’t need to. It’s doing something different, and for the most part it does it well. The mixture of relationship comedy, thriller and violence works surprisingly well. That premise has been done before in films like Keeping Up With The Joneses, Mr & Mrs Smith, and others that surely exist but I can’t be bothered to look up. Of course, there’s a more obvious comparison than either of those: this is a remake of the Norwegian film The Trip. I haven’t seen the original, so I can’t really comment on how the two compare, which is probably something I should have thought about before writing a review of a remake. But I suppose at least this way it means I’m judging OYDB on its own merits rather than making comparisons like, “In the original the person wore a blue t-shirt, in this they wear a red one. Film ruined!” The characters in Keeping Up With The Joneses and Mr & Mrs Smith were professional assassins. These characters aren’t. They’re an actress and a filmmaker who are both unsatisfied in their careers. It kind of reminded me of Game Night (damn, that was a fun movie).
That Game Night comparison is probably the best way of describing the action. There’s a similar satisfaction in watching relatively normal people get caught up in something completely ridiculous and having to improvise their way through it. Dan and Lisa aren’t Jason Bourne; they don’t have a special set of skills that makes them particularly well equipped for what they’re doing. They’re just two people who have decided that murder is the solution to their problems, much like how I deal with poor customer service in restaurants (my editor has told me to let you know that’s a joke; I don’t leave the house to go to restaurants). That amateurism makes the fights much more entertaining. There isn’t the slickness you’d get from a traditional action movie, but it would be weird if these untrained fighters suddenly became action heroes; this isn’t Shang-Chi. They’re grabbing whatever happens to be nearby, throwing themselves at each other and generally doing whatever they can to survive. It gives the violence a scrappy, unpredictable quality, and it also creates some of the film’s funniest moments. You can believe that these people are actually fighting for their lives rather than watching two stunt performers execute perfectly choreographed moves.
It also helps that the film never forgets that they’re an unhappily married couple. Even when they’re fighting for their lives against hostage-takers, they still argue and bicker, desperate to win points against the other. It’s childish, silly, and believable. When they start getting on with each other again, it’s weirdly sweet, much more than a film like this should be.
Not that OYDB is without its problems. It’s a solid 7/10, but it feels like it could be a 9 with some changes. But I’m not sure what. I can’t quite identify why I only really liked this rather than loved it. It’s not the reliance on flashbacks, which really bothered me in This Is Not A Test; I liked the way OYDB utilised flashbacks, as it provided us with setups to jokes where all we knew was the punchline. Maybe it’s just because it seems to lack visual ambition. Nothing really stands out as incredible or memorable. That’s fine with silly films like MacGruber or Popstar, but OYDB is slightly more serious, so standards are higher for it. If something looks cheap or fake in MacGruber, then you can get away with that being part of the joke. You can’t do that in OYDB; it needs to have a certain level of spectacle.
That’s not to sound too discouraging; OYDB is still definitely worth a watch. Prime hasn’t exactly been overflowing with great films this year, and this is definitely among the best they’ve done so far. And if nothing else, I now want to see Samara Weaving in more films where somebody spends two hours trying to kill her. She really does take a beating remarkably well. To make a wrestling comparison: she’s 90’s HBK, or 2010’s Dolph Ziggler, only she occasionally wins.
Troubled Productions 