FRIENDSHIP is a sly rapscallion of a film, part edgy suburban noir, part situation tragedy, part existential comedy, and all a gloss on loneliness and alienation as viewed through the prism of Craig (Tim Robinson), a symphony of well-meaning beige schlubness. Writer/director Andrew DeYoung suffuses this cringe-genre satire with an ironic absurdity that serves all its parts with admirable insight. Yet even at its most devastating, DeYoung never de-humanizes his characters. They are an imperfect lot muddling through as best they can.
We chart Craig’s rise and fall as he negotiates the unfamiliar territory of male bonding and man-crushes, when a misdelivered package introduces him to neighbor Austin (Paul Rudd), a local weatherman who find something sparkling in Craig. To the relief of his cancer-survivor wife, Tami (Kate Mara), Austin invites the usually house-bound Craig over for a drink, during which they bond over prehistoric relics and an adventure in the sewers of their small city. It provides a welcome distraction for Craig, what with Tami, who sees god in an orchid and no future in her marriage, renewing her friendship with her hunky ex. That she is a little too chummy with their son, Steve (Jack Dylan Grazer), is another worry for Craig and only underscores the lack of any relationship between father and son. Craig glows in Austin’s presence, chucking work to hunt mushrooms and hang out with Craig’s circle of similar misfits who burst into song as a means of showig emotional support. Unused to bromance, and sliding glass doors, it all goes south one fateful evening, leaving Craig longing to return to Austin’s good graces, and determined to connect with anyone, even the co-workers that mock him at his job that uses psychology to get people hooked on apps.
Craig’s longing and Austin’s essential niceness juxtapose with an exquisite tension that expresses itself seamlessly across a broad emotional spectrum. Though told strictly from Craig’s POV, including dream sequences of Craig’s derring-do in perilous situations, DeYoung’s deft writing allows us to empathize with Craig while still feeling the varying stages of revulsion that he inspires in those around him. Robinson, with both physical and social awkwardness, delivers a tour-de-force of quiet desperation rendered all the more acute by Craig having once experienced the nirvana of belonging. Though he spins out of control, he never loses the sad little boy eager for the happiness that only friends and family can give him. We don’t so much root for him and Austin to reconcile as wish that they could go their separate ways without trauma or regret.
The humor is deadpan and tinged with melancholy. Craig’s mind-expanding drug trip holds alarmingly pedestrian insights; the city sewer adventures provide life-altering epiphanies with far-reaching consequences; and a drum set purchased with glee brings only heartache and poor choices, all in a landscape littered with broken dreams and inappropriate conduct. FRIENDSHIP dares to show the downside of making friends even as it finds a resolution that, while not perfect, offers the one thing we all need: hope. It is a unique experience that gambols genres, revising and revamping to suit its own weirdly wonderful ends. Think of it as a tart sorbet that will clear your mental palate of its quotidian cobwebs with an anti-hero whose one great gift is that he will always make the worst possible decision in any given situation. Unsettling, to be sure, sweet, only on its own terms, and designed to create a prickly sensation deep in your psyche.
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