Drinking Buddies
Drinking Buddies begins with an appealing promise: Joe Swanberg will treat its comedy framework as a route into character rather than an excuse for noise. The early chemistry between Olivia Wilde and Jake Johnson gives Drinking Buddies an immediate pulse. The story of Drinking Buddies begins from a specific pressure point: Luke and Kate are coworkers at a brewery who spend their nights drinking and flirting heavily. By the end of its 1h 30m running time, the value of Drinking Buddies rests less on novelty than on the care of its execution.
Joe Swanberg shapes Drinking Buddies with an approach that feels careful about tone and generally effective. The best directed passages in Drinking Buddies establish an objective, let the characters respond and then allow the pressure to change naturally. The film delivers more often than it misses in Drinking Buddies, particularly when Joe Swanberg resists the urge to underline an already clear emotion. My main reservation about Drinking Buddies is that the middle loses a little urgency, a limitation that interrupts rather than defines the experience.
The craft of Drinking Buddies is defined by performer rhythm, supported by performer rhythm rather than overwhelmed by decoration. Burn Later Productions gives Drinking Buddies a production framework in which comic timing built around character can remain connected to story. Made from a United States production context, Drinking Buddies uses setting and design to clarify mood before dialogue has to explain it. The technical finish of Drinking Buddies works because image, sound and editing appear to be serving the same immediate purpose.
Drinking Buddies is most involving when the screenplay allows Luke to complicate what initially appears to be a story about Kate. That shift gives Olivia Wilde a more specific problem to carry through Drinking Buddies. Working from material credited to Joe Swanberg, Drinking Buddies reveals the central character at a measured pace instead of rushing toward its largest turn. The later pressure around an important relationship shows why Drinking Buddies benefits whenever cause and consequence remain visibly connected.
Olivia Wilde gives Drinking Buddies its most dependable performance, finding a clear emotional intention beneath the plot. Opposite Olivia Wilde, Jake Johnson brings Drinking Buddies a contrasting pace that prevents the central relationship from feeling flat. Anna Kendrick widens the ensemble of Drinking Buddies through reactions that suggest a life beyond the immediate scene. Joe Swanberg serves the cast of Drinking Buddies best when a look or pause is allowed to finish before the story moves on.
Beneath its plot, Drinking Buddies is most interested in embarrassment, status and the gap between confidence and reality. That concern becomes visible through Olivia Wilde, whose choices allow Drinking Buddies to explore an idea without stopping for a speech. Luke gives the themes of Drinking Buddies a concrete dramatic form rather than leaving them abstract. The emotional value of Drinking Buddies grows whenever Joe Swanberg trusts the audience to connect behaviour with the larger question.
For comedy fans who respond to personality and timing, Drinking Buddies is ultimately a likeable film whose strengths survive its limitations. Its most persuasive combination in Drinking Buddies brings Olivia Wilde together with comic timing built around character under the direction of Joe Swanberg. The fact that the middle loses a little urgency prevents Drinking Buddies from being entirely seamless. Even with that reservation, Drinking Buddies has a clear point of view and enough genuine feeling to justify the journey.
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