Certificate: 12A (sex references, language). Running Time: 109 mins. UK Distributor: Netflix
WHO’S IN IT?
Reese Witherspoon, Ashton Kutcher, Jesse Williams, Tig Notaro, Rachel Bloom, Zoë Chao, Steve Zahn, Wesley Kimmel
WHO’S BEHIND THE CAMERA?
Aline Brosh McKenna (director, writer, producer), Jason Bateman, Michael Costigan, Lauren Neustadter and Reese Witherspoon (producers), Siddhartha Khosla (composer), Florian Ballhaus (cinematographer), Chris A. Peterson (editor)
WHAT’S IT ABOUT?
Two best friends (Witherspoon and Kutcher) trade lives on opposite sides of the country…
WHAT ARE MY THOUGHTS ON YOUR PLACE OR MINE?
Oof. I’m not going to lie to you, dear reader: this one was rough to get through. I know that I’ve said that about quite a number of Netflix original movies lately, some of which are honestly much worse than this one, but there was something so noticeably soulless about Your Place or Mine that the sheer act of watching it made me feel as though I was having all of my energy sucked into the dark and empty vacuum of space. I went into this movie feeling nothing, and somehow I came out of it feeling even less. Such is the zombifying power of Your Place or Mine.
The film is written and directed by Aline Brosh McKenna, a writer who has worked on the screenplays of movies like The Devil Wears Prada, 27 Dresses, Morning Glory and We Bought a Zoo, and makes her directorial debut here. Unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of movie that you can tell was directed by someone who is more prominently a writer, because McKenna initially lets her own writing feel just as much of a headlining star as actual leads Reese Witherspoon and Ashton Kutcher. Case in point: the film opens with Witherspoon’s Debbie and Kutcher’s Peter hooking up in 2003, and we can tell it is this specific year because McKenna conjures up on-screen text to literally point out all the things in the scene that are very much a product of 2003, such as wallet chains on jeans to unnecessarily layered shirts. It gets to a point where we see much more of this text than either Witherspoon or Kutcher, and it feels like an incredibly self-indulgent place to begin your movie, especially when there’s no evidence to support the supposed satire that is perhaps meant to be picked up on. So, almost right away, I had a bad feeling about what the rest of the film was going to be like.
Thankfully, most of what follows isn’t quite as obnoxious, but honestly it could have used some of that because it would have at least contributed to some kind of identity. Instead, we pick up twenty years after Debbie and Peter’s one-night stand, but rather than actually form a relationship, they’ve instead opted to be platonic best friends that live on opposite sides of the country, with him living alone in New York and her as a single mother with young son Jack (Wesley Kimmel) in Los Angeles. Debbie is planning a trip to New York to complete her graduate degree, but has to bail when Jack’s babysitter (a cameoing Rachel Bloom, presumably as a favour to McKenna with whom she co-created the hit series Crazy Ex-Girlfriend) backs out at the last minute – it’s Peter to the rescue, though, as he offers to fly out to LA and look after her son instead. Soon, both Debbie and Peter are on opposite sides of the country once more, where they slowly discover things about each other that the so-called best friends haven’t told each other about, which may or may not lead to some romantic feelings finally being unearthed, and you don’t need me to tell you what happens next.
That’s the thing, though: Your Place or Mine plays it so safe, so sparkly clean and polished, that there is no discernible trace of anything resembling a personality of its own. I often do say with films that follow particular well-worn formulas, especially romantic-comedies, that it’s all about how the familiar conventions are executed, but this film can’t even seem to bring life to any of the tropes it pulls out of its hat, instead presenting the barest of examples without anything proper or interesting to clothe them in. McKenna’s script lazily brings out archetypes and plot beats closely associated with the stereotypical rom-com – the music montages (mostly set to the back catalogue of 70s rock band The Cars), meet-cutes, a wiser-beyond-their-years child, and not one but TWO best friend characters whose lives seem to revolve entirely around the romantic prospects of our leads – and goes no further than that, even though it perhaps thinks they’re as fresh as they’ve ever been. Her direction is also questionable, for there will be characters who just come out from beyond the frame as though they never existed until that moment, while the phone calls shared between Witherspoon and Kutcher – shot using split-screen, one of the only times that McKenna shows style as a filmmaker – are just awkward, because not only are they solely designed to dump a whole load of exposition onto the audience, but you can tell that the actors were most likely using cues for their dialogue together rather than speaking naturally, which makes them sound too robotic for people who are supposedly in sync with each other.
Mostly, though, it’s boring to sit through. Right away, there’s no real reason to care about either of our two romantic leads, because they almost never spend any time on screen together, and in scenes where they are supposed to be having a good old back-and-forth on the phone, Witherspoon and Kutcher’s chemistry feels off, almost as though the majority of their scenes were shot separately so neither of them could really develop a genuine connection with each other (weird, that). I honestly don’t fault any of the actors, including Witherspoon and Kutcher (the former of whom is also credited as a producer), because they showed up to do a job as anyone in a professional capacity would do, and did the best that they could. Nonetheless, they and many of the other supporting actors, from Tig Notaro as one of the aforementioned best friend archetypes, to Steve Zahn who shows up as this weird character that ultimately has nothing to do with the rest of the movie, deserve so much better than to be saddled with a script and direction where nothing ever feels like it begins, ends, or even has a middle. At one point, I thought that the movie was just entering the third act, only to realise moments later that it’s actually the climax; there is such little build-up to anything that happens in this movie that it’s almost impressive how haphazardly it’s been thrown together.
I really struggled to get through Your Place or Mine. I really did. Honestly, I’m amazed that I found this much to write about, because it’s the kind of film that you’d want to forget as soon as it ends, and makes little if any argument as to why it should stay longer than five minutes in your head. I just wouldn’t bother, either at my place or yours.
SO, TO SUM UP…
Your Place or Mine is a mind-numbingly forgettable romantic-comedy that neither does nor says anything to give itself a distinctive personality, which Aline Brosh McKenna’s flatlining script and awkward direction makes all the more difficult to sit through, despite the occasional efforts of stars Reese Witherspoon and Ashton Kutcher.
