This is where my brain went for a couple of hours, today, to forget it was a brain:
It was a funny movie, mostly. Wiig can pen a good script, and she's as fine a comedic actress as is available to the speaking English world, which is a bit of an undersell on my part. She was perfect. Not quite Binoche, but who could be la dame Juliette, really?
We laughed a lot. Wiig pawned the bromance. Low humor, coupled with Wiig's rather brilliant performance made for a good movie. Not The Hangover, but real close.
But feminist filmaking?
That's a stretch.
Spoilers:
The whole movie is about getting a woman (Maya Rudolf) married off to a wealthy fat guy. Her best friend, Annie (Wiig), deconstructs herself in order to compete with a wealthy new friend (Rose Byrne), who bests her in everything because she's wealthy. Ridiculous, enmansion'd estate with a randomly large number of horses, wealthy. I mean, vulgar wealth. The kind of wealth even Helena Bonham Carter might manage to be ashamed of...well, maybe.
The side cast of characters (Ellie Kempfer, Wendon McClendon-Covey, Melissa McCarthy in a breakout role) contribute gags, pratfalls and a number of laughs, mostly around acting pigish or put upon. Wiig's substory involves moving on from an equally vulgarly wealthy loser (John Hamm) to an endearing, understanding cop who wants to rescue her from her own entirely self-imposed deconstruction and disarray.
And then the rich wife pulls it off. She makes a successful wedding, upstages the poorer (destitute, really) character played by Wiig, and they all get to lip sync to a famous daughters' (Wilson Phillips) boutique hit from the very early Nineties.
Cue cop. Rescue. Ride away.
It was funny. I'm not sure how it's feminist.
Update:
For an alternate view, please read this.
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