SHE’S OUT OF MY LEAGUE review: better than the sum of its parts
SHE’S OUT OF MY LEAGUE review: better than the sum of its parts
Apr 05
In a strange parallel universe in which glassy-eyed women are attractive and hockey actually matters, a terminal loser by the name of Kirk Kettner (white, male, straight, annoying) is asked out on a date by Molly McCleish (white, female, straight, wears very supportive bras) and can’t believe his luck. In many ways She’s Out Of My League follows the rom-com formula like a sleepwalking plagiarist, so you know you can expect minor misunderstandings to temporarily separate the unlikely lovers, but you also know it’ll all come back together in the end, and probably in an airport, on a plane that’s about to take off.
But somehow, She’s Out Of My League manages to avoid the more torrid cliches of the genre and build an identity for itself, by borrowing some ideas from the Apatow playbook, some ingredients from the American Pie sub-genre of rom-com / gross-out, and mixing in some laid-back wisdom and fun of its own. Even though I knew how the overall structure of the film would play out, individual scenes were a joy to watch because they somehow subverted my predictions and went in directions I didn’t see coming. Add to this some genuinely amusing characters and situations, and you may have here one of the very rare examples of rom-coms done right.
The film starts shakily. It spends too long on a scene introducing Kirk (Jar Baruchel) and his mates, and their humour is initially grating and forced. But, like mould on a bathroom mirror, the jokes grow on you. There’s an impressively broad range of humour in the film, varying from gross-out physical comedy to hilariously awkward romantic dialogue to the perennially-popular abuse of swear-words in increasingly complex and impressive ways. So the film firmly supports the com part of the rom-com formula, but what about the rom bit?
Thankfully the film doesn’t rely on female star Alice Eve’s looks to imply attraction. There are some funny scenes where men preen and posture while staring at her slack-jawed, but she’s actually a genuinely nice person to boot: laid-back, easy-going, and suspiciously honest. She’s cutesy in that peculiarly American “girl-next-door” way, so if you’re American you might find her chipmunk smile and overstyled hair attractive, but the script had to sell her to me based on her personality, and somehow, it managed not to fail (double negative! Sorry). The pair’s romance isn’t likely, but they’ve got just enough chemistry, fueled by Baruchel’s feigned ineptitude, that you want them to have a good old crack at this whole dating thing.
Speaking of performances, everyone from Kirk’s and Molly’s parents, to their friends and coworkers, to estranged lovers and quirky siblings are all engaging and interesting in their own way. There’s a lot going on to distract you from the romance, and thankfully most of it is funny (or at least, amusing). The awkwardness of introducing an irritating and unruly family to a new lover is covered twice, from different angles, and both times it’s funny and helps to build the bonds between the two lovers.
The cast is entirely unknown, as well, and this actually helps the film. There are no typecast performances, the film was made for around US$20 million (bargain!), and the filmmakers got to cast funny, talented people instead of popular, untalented people. The best evidence of this is in Kirk’s mate Stainer (don’t ask), played by T.J. Miller, a bloke who looks exactly like a cross between Will Ferrell and Napoleon Dynamite. At first I though “This guy’s just gonna play like a cross between Will Ferrell and Napoleon Dynamite the whole time,” and at times he does indeed come off like a second-rate comedian, but at others he soars and takes on a style of his own. All the bit-players wind up like this as well, taking on pleasantly individualistic styles and identities, and this helps the script to cohere on screen even if doesn’t on page.
It’s not all sunshine and laughter and lollipops though. The film’s cast is exclusively white and American (Baruchel’s Canadian — sue me), so if you come from any other country / culture you might find it claustrophobically white-centric. I buy into American entertainment because it presents a window into such a strange world, and in this case the world is interesting and funny, as well. Also, for all its merits the script is ultimately formulaic, and fails to provide succinct closure to the lovers’ fate, and doesn’t tie up a few side-character sub-plots it easily could have. Oh, and if you’ve never been a self-deprecating under-achiever or self-confessed loser in your life, you’ll find Kirk’s interminably low self-esteem incredibly annoying; if, however, you’ve ever been on the social outs you’ll probably find something endearing to latch onto here.
The biggest problem, though, is the scoring system alluded to in the title. There’s a “DOW of hotness,” or something, where Kirk is a 5 and Molly is a “hard” 10, and you can’t date someone more than two points higher than you on the scale. Kirk’s deadbeat friends are the folks who come up with this stupid system, and it doesn’t really factor well into the story, even though it’s used to contrive some of the biggest emotional valleys in the film.
In addition, the self-honesty exhibited by the characters is a little frightening. They happily sum up their deepest subconscious workings like they’re all professional psychiatrists who’ve cloned and then interviewed themselves (ex: “I asked you out because you were safe, because I thought you wouldn’t hurt me”) — do people really talk like that in real life? Maybe some people do, but surely not everyone. And I had to keep reminding myself that people significantly older than me are still stuck in that “Swearing and bodily functions are not amusing” state of mind, so write this film off if you’re one of those people.
I can’t really think of much else to say about She’s Out Of My League. I can’t speak for the other sex, but the male perspective of the relationship is well-represented; Molly is treated as a human being and not just a piece of meat (Baruchel bares as much flesh as Eve — if not more); the side-characters are quirky and funny enough to distract from Baruchel’s sometimes-annoying Woody Allen impersonation; the relationship is sweet enough to gain our support; and there’s enough variety in the film to amuse a wide range of audiences. I might be reacting unreasonably in favour of the film because I was expecting absolute, undiluted dross, but either way She’s Out Of My League managed to submerge me completely in its world, and I was thoroughly entertained from start to finish.
She’s Out Of My League score
73/100
