5/10
Aubrey Plaza has this look about her. She is short with large eyeballs so she has
this way of looking up at people and showing them non-verbally that she thinks
they are morons and whatever situation she is in at the moment is stupid. If you are a fan of the TV show Parks & Recreation, you have seen
this character before in April Ludgate.
The filmmakers of Safety Not Guaranteed most likely
thought, “Well, we have this character straight from Parks & Rec, I guess
we’ll hire the same actress.” Darius
(Plaza) is a direct rip-off of April Ludgate; however, instead of working for
Amy Poehler in Pawnee, Indiana, she is an intern at Seattle Magazine.
Darius and fellow intern Arnau (Karan Soni) volunteer to tag
along with one of the magazine’s journalists, Jeff (Jake M. Johnson), for a few
days out to the cold Washington State coast to track down the guy who posted an
abnormal classified ad. Kenneth (Mark
Duplass) seeks a partner for time travelling, but the prospective partner must
bring their own weapons and he warns them that their safety is not guaranteed. This is not a foundation for the hardest
hitting journalism, but then again, the film does not make out Seattle Magazine
to be the most informative periodical.
Picking up where Jeff fails, Darius uses some of her
feminine skills to convince Kenneth she is interested in being his time
travelling partner and they embark on training.
Training consists of target practice with a pistol, breaking and
entering and grand larceny at a research lab, and sitting around a campfire
playing the zither. Jeff, meanwhile,
tracks down his old flame from 20 years ago.
He has idealized a summer from his past and is convinced Liz (Jenica
Bergere) is the one who got away. A
simple example to explain just what kind of person Jeff is comes from this
conversation with Liz, “So, tell me about your life Jeff. Well, I have an Escalade.”
There is something off about Safety Not Guaranteed and
I believe it is the script; it tries way too hard to be the next quirky
comedy. First of all, her name is
Darius? Strike one. Three oddly matched and eccentric people go
on a road trip, share a hotel room, and Jeff spends an inordinate amount of
time trying to get Arnau laid. Strike
two. The zither is strike three. Also, there is an undercurrent of mental
illness only hinted at in the script but far more blatant on screen about
Kenneth and his time travel ideas. Would
a journalist really attempt to write an article mocking a guy who could have a
serious mental issue all because he posted a newspaper ad?
Mark Duplass, who is also this film’s executive producer,
might as well be channeling Zach Galifianakis and his character from the
Hangover series. Everything he does is
over the top, aimed at the cheap laugh, and leaves a million unasked questions
about how he has gotten to this point in his life. Duplass directed both Jeff, Who Lives at Home
and Cyrus
so he should be well aware of the importance of three dimensional characters
and how fast the mocking of a character that may or may not be all there can
get old with the audience real quick.
Perhaps he is not aware since Cyrus was pretty horrible.
April from Parks & Rec does not need her own spin-off
story. Her character works best as a
sidekick who shows up every now and then to roll her eyes, say something
snarky, and move on. A full feature
length film of that attitude wears thin.
Jeff’s subplot with his long lost love Liz is more promising and works
out exactly how it would in real life, so here is a big kudos for first time
screenwriter Derek Connolly. However, if
Connolly had throttled back a bit on the overt attempt to be quirky ala Zooey
Deschanel, Safety Not Guaranteed would have been far better for it.
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