Ilana Glazer is a big talent. Michelle Buteau is a big talent. Pamela Adlon is a big talent. With a screenplay by Glazer (co-written by Josh Rabinowitz), co-starring Glazer and Buteau, and directed by Adlon, Babes could have been a film about friendship and motherhood filled with funny and insightful truths. Sadly, the screenplay takes the easy route and is nothing more than another gross out movie where adults act like drunk 19 year olds at a frat party. The film is basically a (somewhat) toned down retread of Glazer’s excellent Comedy Central show, Broad City.
The picture introduces Glazer as Eden, a modern yoga instructor who’s best friend Dawn (a charming Michelle Buteau), is going into labor with her second child. Once the baby is born (in an excruciatingly unfunny scene that begins this film’s obsession with scatalogical humor), Eden leaves the hospital to get her friend sushi. On the subway, she has a charming encounter with Claude (Stephan James), an actor working on a Martin Scorsese film. Eden and Claude’s short screen time together holds the film’s best moments. The two actors have an intoxicating chemistry that promises something honest and pure. Sadly, this never comes to pass, as the screenplay is more concerned about keeping up with the raunchy spirit of a film like Bridesmaids (Which I thoroughly enjoyed) or the “bro” humor of a Judd Apatow picture, rather than creating something special or unique.
As her potential beau never calls again nor returns her texts, Eden writes it off as a one night stand. The kicker being that she finds herself pregnant with his baby. Of course, Eden is the very definition of unprepared. She lives her life with the free-spirit of a teenager and cannot seem to let go of her younger self’s way of dealing with reality.
Having no clue of how to go through a pregnancy alone, Eden latches onto Dawn and her husband, Marty (Hasan Minhaj), hoping they can help her navigate the choppy waters of single motherhood. All of this is too much on Dawn. Their lifelong friendship finds itself on the ropes, as Eden’s married mother-of-two bestie is dealing with madness in her own life.
Ilana Glazer and Michelle Buteau are great. These two are skilled comedic actresses and whatever project they find themselves in benefits from their presence. Where Babes stumbles is in the performances versus the tonal inconsistencies of the screenplay. The jokes about Dawn and Eden’s friendship, quirks, and rituals don’t land for the audience. The writers haven’t built enough foundation for their backgrounds to play. When we laugh, it is due to the delivery by the actresses, not at the intended humor in the writing.
The near-constant scatalogical and menstrual jokes don’t blend with the scenes that try to be sincere. While the aforementioned Bridesmaids includes a popular comedic moment where the main cast gets food poisoning and cannot control their bowels, that was only one scene. Babes has too much of this type of lowbrow humor, preventing the script’s deeper themes from breaking free.
The picture is full of seriocomic possibilities that are never allowed to bloom. A subplot involving Eden’s estranged agoraphobic father (a wasted Oliver Platt) gets only two quick moments. Platt is very good and you can see the potent subtext in his character trying to get out, but the film is in too much of a hurry to return to the broader comedy.
Pamela Adlon created one of the finest television shows of the decade with Better Things, a witty and extremely moving look at single motherhood and the bond between a mom and her three daughters. Directing and co-writing most of the episodes over its five season run, Adlon crafted a series where the humor came from the natural behavior of the characters and not forced cartoonish situations. For this supreme talent, there was hope that Adlon’s feature directing debut would include the wit, warmth, and found in her groundbreaking show. Sadly, it does not.
As a whole, Babes is a cringeworthy watch, not because most of the jokes fall flat and there truly are too many scat and menstrual jokes, but because of a script that fails the talents involved.
There are a few minor chuckles now and again, but (to quote Neil Simon), “Six days, does not a week make.”
Babes
Written by Ilana Glazer & Josh Rabinowitz
Directed by Pamela Adlon
Starring Ilana Glazer, Michelle Buteau, Hasan Minhaj, John Carroll Lynch, Oliver Platt, Sandra Bernhard
R, 104 Minutes, Neon, FilmNation Entertainment
