Jul 23, 2019
Hi everyone!
Welcome back to our first Takeover Tuesday of the third quarter, with the return of our good friends Julie and Kathleen from the How I Met Your Friends Podcast. Well, we’re good friends now, after a little group therapy over the minor little island invasion a few weeks back. First, we went to Central Perk for coffee, then to MacLaren’s Pub from there, and by the time we got through about 22 minutes of solid comedy with a hint of drama, everything turned out well for everyone. Oh yeah, about that island invasion, check out Episode #516 (“Grass is Greener”) for the start of the recent Big Heads Media Takeover, and especially Julie’s review for Episode #518 (“The Craft”). Julie and Kathleen are back together to start a semi-regular review of movies involving actors from either “Friends” or “How I Met Your Mother”, and after some brief negotiations, we came up with the perfect first feature for them to review.
If you’d like to join the fun for Takeover Tuesday, reach out to One Movie Punch on social media or using the website form at onemoviepunch.com. Please bear with us as we’re moving sites. We have a few openings left in August and we’re also looking for folks to review horror movies for October. You can find more information at onemoviepunch.com/takeover-tuesday. Every reviewer not only gets access to our audience, but their promo run right before the review, as we’re about to hear for the ladies of How I Met Your Friends. Come join the fun!
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Here we go!
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HOW I MET YOUR FRIENDS PROMO
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Today’s movie is “Murder Mystery,” rated PG-13, the Netflix
original from Happy Madison Productions, screenplay by James
Vanderbilt, directed by Kyle Newachek, and starring Jennifer
Aniston and Adam Sandler.
This is a reteaming of Aniston and Sandler after 2011’s “Just Go
With It.” They play married couple Nick and Audrey Spitz, who after
15 years of marriage have never been on a honeymoon. When Audrey
reaches her breaking point, Nick surprises… heh, “surprises” her
with a trip to Europe, which includes sightseeing on a crowded tour
bus, a la “National Lampoon’s European Vacation”.
Enter Charles Cavendish (Luke Evans), who upon knowing Audrey for all of five minutes, invites her and Nick to his billionaire uncle’s yacht for a weekend getaway. Once Nick and Audrey compare that to the tour bus, they unsurprisingly pick the yacht.
What ensues is nothing short of a “Clue”/”Orient Express”/murder dinner party extravaganza, including a plethora of eccentric guests: an actress, a colonel, a Russian bodyguard, a billionaire, a viscount, an unemployed son, a maharajah, a ski instructor, a race car driver, and a French detective.
After billionaire Malcolm Quince is murdered while disinheriting his entire family, except his new wife, including son Tobey, nephew Charles Cavendish, godson Juan Carlos, and various life-long friends, who believed they would inherit a portion of his $70 BILLION estate, everyone on the yacht is sequestered to their staterooms.
Audrey, already obsessed with murder mystery novels, sees plots from books in the situation and wants to solve the murders. Nick, a police officer who strives to be a detective, wants her to take it more seriously, but agrees to help her find the “killer.” More people are killed, with Nick and Audrey becoming prime suspects.
Throughout the investigation, Nick and Audrey visit well-known European cities like Monaco, France, and Lake Como, Italy, though they don’t get to enjoy them with people shooting at them. There is even the quintessential car chase, where Audrey gets to drive a Ferrari Testarossa instead of Nick (who was very excited that his mustache made him Magnum PI in the car).
Both Aniston and Sandler are funny, and their marital strain and bickering play well into the confusion of amateur detectives caught in an international hunt for a murderer. However, at times it feels like they are a completely mismatched married couple.
Sandler’s Nick can be cringe-inducing, often saying the thing most people would keep in their head. He’s also obsessed with food and when dinner will be served, going so far as to take entire platters of food--one of shrimp cocktail and one of French macarons.
(Side note: Julie almost launched herself into the TV to see what colors/flavors those macarons might be).
On the flip side, Aniston’s Audrey seems to care a lot about what other people think of her husband, his job, and the things that fly out of his mouth. Of the two characters, Audrey is the more likable. We promise we aren’t biased toward Jennifer Aniston.
This movie isn’t changing lives or the genre, but is an amusing way to spend a Wednesday night with pizza and a beer. Especially if you are fans of Aniston and Sandler.
And, of course, we are.
Rotten Tomatoes: 46
Metacritic: 38
IMDB: 6/10
Julie’s Rating: 7.5/10
Kathleen’s Rating: 7.0/10
Murder Mystery is rated PG-13 and is available only on Netflix.