Bros. (2022)
Dir: Nichols Stoller
Writters: Billy Eichner; Nicholas Stoller
Stars: Billy Eichner; Luke Macfarlane; Guy Branum
NO BROS?
by paulieb2003@gmail.com
Hey gang – so this is not a review of Bros – I didn’t see it. In fact, nobody saw it, but it still arrived in theaters Sept 30. It kind of flopped raking in only $4 million. Yea, that’s not just Friday’s numbers, that’s the whole weekend, $4 million. Totaling $4 million for all 3 days. Yes it got a wide release, over 3,300 theaters. That’s a lot of theaters. Yes it kind of had a star, Billy Eichner – the guy from the Man On The Street clips that are often hilarious. Yes, it had a fantastic director, Nicholas Stoller, the guy who directed the smash hit Forgetting Sarah Marshall. And yes, it had a fantastic producer, Judd Apatow who did Bridesmaids, 40 year old Virgin, Trainwreck and many more.
So what happened?
According to sources, Bros had a good budget of $20 million, so it’s not a cheap film – but it’s not making that money back. Billy Eichner says his movie failed because the gays didn’t show up to support his film. Guess what Billy, nobody showed up to support your film. It’s a weird thing because it was well publicized, had very reliable talent working on it, had hitmakers put their golden touch on it, on paper, if I were a studio executive, this should have been a hit.
This creative team made hits for Amy Schumer, Kirstin Wig, even made John Cena look funny in one scene!! They launched Steve Carrell, Chris O’Dowd, Seth Rogan, and so many comic actors, why not Billy Eichner!?!
I will be honest with you – when I was watching the trailer, i saw Billy – and that was good – but I was hoping he had a star to hitch his trailer to. I thought his co-star would be Channing Tatum, or someone along those lines. Instead, Billy is teamed up with Luke Macfarlane. Who? What? Exactly. I mean Billy is funny, but these movies always had a cast of solid comic actors to hold each other up. Who is Luke and is he even funny? Billy is a nice surprise in a movie – you know, “hey look, it’s that guy! Oh it’s great he got a shot at a movie – now who’s he with” is what you think right away. Who is he with? Well, here he is with Luke. Who’s Luke? Nobody. So, no – I’m not spending $50 to see if Luke is funny or not. Thanks anyway.
Look at Bridesmaids – it wasn’t just Kirstin Wig doing her own thing – it launched Meliisa McCarthy, it had her best comedic co-star, Maya Rudolph, Chris O’Dowd, Rose Byrne, I mean it had a very very strong cast.
Bros looks like it was just Billy, writing for Billy, with no help at all. That’s fine if you’re Jim Carrey, but if you’re doing this kind of thing you need a very strong cast, and Bros does not have it. Bros barely has one, because let’s face it, Billy has no track record in film. So you count Billy has a half. So Bros has half a star in it.
Sara Marshall had Bill Hader, Jason Segel, Paul Rudd, Jonah Hill, Russel Brand. All these guys can improv with the very best of them on any given day. Add Apatow screaming lines to them behind the scenes and you have a really good time and a hit movie.
Basically these kinds of films are friends messing around with each other, improvising and having fun. Judd Apatow usually laughs his ass off and screams lines from off camera to bring the level up a little bit. So these films are just comedians clowning around with each other, having fun on screen and it makes us have fun off screen.
Bros does not have this. No one seems to be friends with each other. They are just doing their job, reading their lines, and from the trailer, it shows.
I don’t know the story, I didn’t see it yet – but that’s the feeling I get from the clips that I’ve seen. No big star attraction, and no one having fun. I’m no expert analyst, but that’s my two cents.
Billy should have got his friends to be in it, have some fun, let Judd and Nicholas give them direction while they have the time of their lives.
But you know what – that’s no guarantee of success either – so who knows.
Just forget I said anything. See ya next week.
