Joshy (DVD) – Movie Review
Follow Genre: Comedy
Director: Jeff Baena
Distributor: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Duration: 89 minutes

Joshy (DVD) – Movie Review

Site Score
6.1
Good: Has its fun moments
Bad: Overall not very original
User Score
4.7
(3 votes)
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Rating: 4.7/10 (3 votes cast)

Imagine you being engaged to the love of your life, only to find her dead in your apartment, on your birthday, with a belt around her neck. Your bachelor party already planned, what are you supposed to do? Well, Joshy’s friends thought it might be a good idea to go through with it, and there you have it: the plot of today’s film called Joshy.

Joshy

When Joshy (Thomas Middleditch) comes home from work on his birthday, his fiancée Rachel (Alison Brie) offers to make him a homecooked meal, while he can do a short workout at the gym. He agrees, but when he comes back home again, he gets anything but a lovingly made birthday dinner. Instead, he finds Rachel dead, having strangled herself with one of his belts. Now, four months later, Joshy and his friends decide to spend the weekend in Ojai at a home they rented. Since the house was already rented for Joshy’s bachelor party, they figured they might as well go through with it, despite the fact that there is no wedding to be celebrated any more.

Eric (Nick Kroll) takes the lead, trying to make sure that they all, and especially Joshy, have a good time this weekend. Thus he takes the guys to a bar, where they meet Jodi (Jenny Slate). Since Jodi lost the key to her apartment and can’t find her friends anywhere, she tags along with the guys when Ari (Adam Pally) invites her to. For Adam (Alex Ross Perry) things aren’t going that smoothly, as his longtime girlfriend calls him that night to tell him that it’s over. Eric seems to be the only one really in for the fun, thus to keep the night alive, he calls up his friend Greg (Brett Gelman).

Joshy 2

The next few days go on more or less in the same fashion. Nobody is really there for a bachelor party, but rather to have some time off and see how Joshy is coping with Rachel’s death, without bringing up the subject. Eric keeps trying to make the whole weekend a party, taking his friends to a casino, inviting strippers, doing drugs and so on, but all of his good intentions seem to be in vain, as everybody has got just too much on their mind, be it personal or concerning Joshy.

Joshy’s story is actually both a fun one and a sad one. While especially Eric does all kinds of wild things to make Joshy forget about the bachelor party he should have had, every now and then the topic of Rachel’s suicide does come up, providing some awkward moments. Other than that, you’ll just see a bunch of guys, each with their own troubled lives, just doing random things. The story has some depth to it because of Joshy’s past, but overall it is still just a random film with random characters doing random things. Bad? No, but we can’t say it’s very original either.

Joshy 1

While Thomas Middleditch’s character Joshy is the one the film is named after, Nick Kroll seems to take the lead most of the time. His character Eric is the one who keeps things going and prevents the weekend from getting dull. Kroll is actually quite amusing to watch, as he is both irresponsible and sensitive, both a child and an adult in his actions. Thomas Middleditch doesn’t do a bad job himself, but stays more to the background until the end of the film, also due to his character’s personality.

When it comes to extras, we can be quite short: there aren’t any included on this DVD release. While it’s never really necessary to add extras, it’s always nice to have some nonetheless. In this case, a gag reel or bloopers would have been a good idea.

Conclusion

Joshy isn’t much more than your average guys going-on-a-weekend-without-girlfriends kind of film, yet every now and then, the film does get more serious due to not only Joshy’s situation, but also the personal lives of the others. It makes sure that the film isn’t too plain and has a bit more depth than you might have expected. Acting is quite decent, but we were a bit disappointed that there weren’t any extras. Other than that, this is a film that is quite all right, but just won’t blow you away.

Joshy 3

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Rating: 4.7/10 (3 votes cast)
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Joshy (DVD) - Movie Review, 4.7 out of 10 based on 3 ratings

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