Seán here with an Awards Season Palette Cleanser to help you see beyond March 4th and onward to early summer. And what better way to note the passing of the seasons than with a Melissa McCarthy movie? Life of the Party, directed by McCarthy's husband, Ben Falcone, and written and produced by the two of them is set to be a scud missile of McCarthy's talents. But for every Spy there's a Tammy (and The Boss, and um, Ghostbusters) but by now there's no going back on the fact that a Melissa McCarthy film is something of a modern day event picture.
In Life of the Party, McCarthy plays Deanna Miles, a recently divorced suburban Mom who decides, decades later, to go back to college and finally get her degree. The catch? She ends up in the same class as her daughter! Uh-oh! It feels a little obvious when writing it down, but with McCarthy deeply involved in the project you can't feel anything but optimism...
YES
- Since this is a take on Rodney Dangerfield's 1986 Back to School, it has the charming setup of comedies of a bygone era, and McCarthy knows how to exploit that.
- M-McC's superpower is never being afraid to make a fool of herself for the sake of laughs, something not every actor can do. Her Waiting to Exhale moment? Brilliant.
- Maya Rudolph. That is all.
- Call me crazy but I get the impression that this trailer isn't using up all the best bits like others so wilfully do. Let's all assume she "finds herself" but the rest is a happy surprise!
- McCarthy's a fish out of water, albeit a fish who thinks they know what they're doing and is your Mom.
- You know this film is going to have loads of heart too - 10 bonus points if it makes your eyes all misty at some point.
- A supporting cast that includes Matt Walsh as McCarthy's ex-husband, and Jacki Weaver as her mother.
- Mothers and daughters haven't been this united in the cinema since Lady Bird!
- It isn't Bad Moms.
NO
- Okay, I'm not from the USA so can someone please tell me that not all American campuses look like this and it really is "just the movies"? Sororities, fraternities, red cups - the whole lot. Is this real?
- Again, do US college students really all look like this, the girls and their long hair and pretty outfits? Everyone I went to college with was a wreck.
- If the substance of the film is entirely that Deanna is Maddie's Mom and 'omg how embarrassing'... the joke may run thin quickly.
- Melissa McCarthy is hot or miss. She couldn't save Ghostbusters. The soup jokes?
MAYBE SO
- Christina Aguilera is also listed as being in the cast. What if Life of the Party and Burlesque exist within the same universe?!
- Molly Gordon is on the TV version of Animal Kingdom, the film that introduced Jacki Weaver to an internaional audience, and JW is playing her grandmother. That's cute!
- She knocks back shots. She dances. She kisses young fit jocks, the types that only exist in films. Let's hope for a little bit more than the obvious schtick.
It's Melissa McCarthy's timing, warmth, charm and ultra powerful vagoogle that makes her like no one else in the movies today. Can you see anyone else pulling this off? It's a YES from me.
But what do I know? Please use the comments to make me feel worthless!