Game Night Review: Unravels into a Stellar Comedy

The comedy genre and I do not tend to see eye to eye. Perhaps I am just strict when it comes to my sense of humor but I usually find myself unimpressed with modern comedies as they often have the same type of jokes and like to beat you over the head with their punchlines. However when it comes to this profession you cannot pick your battles and sometimes you have to endure certain movies. That was the case for the newest comedy in theaters: Game Night. Directed by the team of John Frances Daley and Jonathan Goldstein Game Night takes the concept of a murder mystery and seemingly mixes it with a comedy of errors. Despite my grievances with modern comedies Game Night,surprisingly, looked entertaining as its ideas could have easily make it an enjoyable comedy. After watching the film I can say that perhaps the biggest twist of the evening was how much I enjoyed Game Night.

The movie tells the story of Max (Jason Bateman) and Annie (Rachel McAdams) who enjoy having a game night with their friends. However when Max’s brother Brooks (Kyle Chandler) decides to make an epic game night, the evening is turned upside when Brooks is kidnapped by real crooks and the group is caught in a mystery to crazy to believe. The plot to Game Night did not go the way that I expected it to, but that was by no means a bad thing. The plot did feature a comedy of errors concept but handled it in a different way. Along with this was the story’s mystery which was effective as, while may not have been complex, it managed to work thanks to the story’s narrative. Yet this was not to say that the story did not have some puzzling directions. This was the case in how the plot handled its subplots. The subplots were effective by keeping things interesting but they had underwhelming conclusions as, rather than coming to a head, they were all but dropped by the film’s climax. Another issue was that the movie overplayed its mystery a little too much. The twists in the story were effective but with the way that things play out it does get confusing on how certain plot points fit together.