MOVIE REVIEW: ANYONE BUT YOU

 

Despite an amazing first date, Bea and Ben's initial attraction quickly turns sour. However, when they unexpectedly find themselves at a destination wedding in Australia, they pretend to be the perfect couple to keep up appearances.

Director: Will Gluck

Cast: Sydney Sweeney, Glen Powell, Alexandra Shipp, GaTa, Hadley Robinson, Michelle Hurd, Dermot Mulroney, Darren Barnet, Bryan Brown, Rachel Griffiths

Release Date: December 22, 2023

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Rated R for language throughout, sexual content and brief graphic nudity.

Runtime: 1h 43m

Review:

Anyone but You is a fairly paint by the numbers rom-com that toys with being a raunchier romp before settling into the usual genre clichés that we've seen plenty of times before.  To his credit, Will Gluck delivers a slick looking, breezy film that unabashedly uses Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing as its basic template while occasionally lifting full lines of dialogue from the play.   It’s an interesting choice that never works since those moments are played off as a running joke with the characters stating they just made up the rather robust bit of dialogue lifted from the Bard.  It would have been an interesting approach if they'd leaned into it instead of just sporadically shoehorning it randomly with little pretext or payoff.  The film does something similar with its random forays into raunchy territory while never committing to it.  Paired with the random Shakespearean lines, the film never finds its own flow or rhythm since everything in between is overly familiar and broad.  Gluck has proven capable of making a memorable genre film like Emma Stone's Easy A but this film relies far too heavily on tired tropes.  It’s a shame since the cast seems up for pretty much anything especially the overly attractive onscreen couple.  Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell are clearly having fun with the material which makes the film an easy watch even if decidedly forgettable.  Sweeney and Powell have solid chemistry, but you never buy the fact that the characters supposedly have a certain level of disdain for each other which makes it readily apparent they'll end up together.  The supporting cast is made up of familiar faces like Dermot Mulroney, Rachel Griffiths, Michelle Hurd and Bryan Brown but the film doesn't take advantage of the talent instead being mostly satisfied with them delivering broad strokes of comedy.  It all leaves Anyone but You as a passable but forgettable rom-com that could have been far more memorable.

C