Hit-and-miss for Howard. The tone flits, sometimes uncomfortably, from Vaughn-fuelled laugh-fest to relationship drama, but it's a winner compared to many of the clunkly comedies out there.
Pious, intense and ofter hectoringly implausible, the movie runs on empty while making loud "vroom-vroom" sounds.
A disaster.
Director Ron Howard's attempt at a black comedy drama is merely cynical and depressing.
Painfully dragged out, with one bloated scene after another.
The unknowability of other peoples' relationships is a decent jump-off for grown-up comedy, but this collapses into comic mayhem, falling-out-of-trees slapstick, snore-bore misunderstandings and a sizeable distance between laughs.
Hamstring by its own dilemma – whether to make us laugh or cry – and guilty of squandering a decent cast, Howard’s film is as heavy-going as a messy divorce.
In the end it belly flops into a weird nothingness.
A comedy without laughs, and a drama without tension.
The end result is a humourless mess.
Nothing’s funny. Nothing’s real.
Rather less fun than a badly executed coronary bypass.
General release. Check local listings for show times.