Day 108 - The Big Sick

Day 108          The Big Sick [2017]

                          

Screenplay                    Emily V. Gordon & Kumail Nanjiani

Director                         Michael Showalter

Cinematography            Brian Burgoyne

Music                            Michael Andrews

Leads                            Kumail Nanjiani, Zoe Kazan, Holly Hunter, Ray Romano, Anupam Kher

Production                     FilmNation Entertainment, Apatow Productions

IMDb                                 7.6/10

Rotten Tomatoes                98%

Lots of hype. I heard ‘best Rom-Com of 2017’ thrown about, as well as ‘one of the best films of 2017’. However, I think if this film had not been based on Gordon and Nanjiani’s real experiences then it would have been just another pleasant-but-boring Rom-Com with a happy ending. Perhaps that’s unfair, it is certainly an original look at an overdone genre, but again this isn’t through clever writing. It is all about a struggling Pakistan-born stand-up comedian who falls in love with a girl named Emily (Kazan). Emily then gets a rare illness that forces her to be put into a coma. Although Kumail and Emily broke up just before her illness, he is there for her and forms an unlikely friendship with her parents. Ray Romano and Holly Hunter play Emily’s parents and they were definitely the highlights of this otherwise average film. Romano instantly cheered me up in his back-and-forth with Kumail and saved a few points in the ratings. The humour is dry all the way through, sometimes too dry for its own good. Everything that Kumail says seems to be in jest, hence we don’t really get to the core of who he is, despite the one-man show about his life and his family problems, his personality didn’t seem to shine through. The only moment it did was during his on-stage bomb where he loses control of his emotions. This was the true-to-life part of the film I thought we needed more of – people underestimate how hard it can be as an actor, a comedian, a presenter to turn up every day and perform to the standard that everyone expects of you. It’s not as easy as just being yourself and goes a little way to explaining why actors are often considered to be divas. I’m afraid to say this isn’t as good a movie as everyone seems to think. You know how when people are asked to describe someone, and they say ‘yeah, they’re nice’ and that’s it – it’s never a good thing. This film is just far too ‘nice’.

Acting                               3 / 4

Writing                           2.5 / 4

Cinematography                2 / 4

Music                             1.5 / 4

HWF rating                  2 / 4