Safety Not Guaranteed

This film is based around an actual classified ad about a chap looking for someone to travel back in time with him.

Presumably it was placed as a joke but the film has a journalist called Jeff (Jake Johnson) investigating the ad, to find out who is behind it but more importantly to find out how crazy they are. Jeff takes with him two less than eager interns Darius (Aubrey Plaza) and Arnau (Karan Soni).

They can do most of the leg work because Jeff's own interest is limited. He has an ulterior motive for going; he intends to go back in time himself because the town they are heading for is where his ex-girlfriend from college lives. He doesn't need a time machine to attempt to start up with her again, just a good excuse.

Once there the three of them take the odd approach of not actually replying to the ad but instead stalking the guy by finding out where he lives and works, then asking him outright if they can be his time travel partner. When Jeff has no success, Darius has a go.

Kenneth (Mark Duplass) is undoubtedly the local misfit but Darius finds him oddly appealing and the more time she spends with him, the more of a connection she forms with him. He's going back to 2001 to save a girlfriend who was killed in a car accident. Only she wasn't and as we find out, still lives nearby. Darius has her own reasons for wanting to travel back, to prevent the death of her Mother.

Meanwhile Jeff achieves his aim, gets to hook up with his ex, beds her and then falls out with her. Making it all a bit pointless plot wise. There's another sub-plot concerning Arnau. He's painted as your typical nerd in horned-rimmed glasses who is uncomfortable with women. So Jeff sets him up with some girls.

Although largely unnecessary these diversions follow the same sort of theme e.g. looking at relationships involving people who are quite different e.g. nerds, misfits/weirdoes, damaged females or annoying jerks in Jeff’s case, saying perhaps we should just accept people as they are. This does take screen time from the main story, which, to be honest, is the old one of where the damaged female falls for the misfit. Yep, I've just duped myself into seeing another RomCom.

This one though does have good characters. It's also better written and has more to offer than what you might expect. The time travel angle is more a façade for finding oneself and putting right past mistakes.

There is a time machine but we don't see it until the end. Thankfully. Which means the film doesn’t take too big a leap into the unbelievable. Kenneth stretches out his hand for Darius to join him aboard, asking her to decide whether he’s a genius or simply completely nuts... He may be both.

Finally kudos to Mark Duplass, who not only starred but co-produced and supplied the song to accompany the closing credits. A busy guy.

Humpday

‘Humpday’ is about a guy called Ben (Mark Duplass), who has settled down into what he describes as the ‘white picket fence’ lifestyle of marriage with his attractive young wife Anna (Alycia Delmore). Perhaps the only ingredient they are missing is a child but they’re working on that.

What they probably didn’t need was for Ben’s old college buddy Andrew (Joshua Leonard) to show up, out of the blue, on their doorstep in the middle of the night. Andrew has been away travelling, he sees himself as a bit of a ‘Kerouac’, and consequently it's been a long time since they’ve seen each other. They immediately drop back into a ‘two lads together’ type situation.

The following night, Andrew ends up at a party thrown by a girl he just happened to meet and he invites Ben over to join him. After drinking too much alcohol and smoking too much dope, they end up agreeing to make a short film for ‘HumpFest’, the local amateur pornography festival. Their idea is to produce something truly unique, a film of two straight guys having gay sex and they propose to star in it themselves. The idea being that it would not be gay, it would be beyond gay and it would not porn, it would be art...

Ben gets home to find that his night has gotten in the way of the baby making process much to Anna’s frustration. His next problem is how he’s going to square his new acting career with her. This is the best part of the film, as Ben spectacularly fails to tell Anna his plans and then Andrew spills the beans because he assumes Ben has told her. Problem is from here, the film goes downhill.

In the cold light of day, both Andrew and Ben regret what they have agreed to but neither will back down. Both feel they have something to prove. Ben that he’s not as ‘white picket fence’ as Andrew thinks he is and Andrew that perhaps he’s no ‘Kerouac’.

The ‘porn shoot’ in a hotel room is long and drawn out, we spend half an hour or so with the guys in that room, when a few minutes would have done because in the end, they don’t go through with it. They quickly realise their idea is going nowhere, the audience has already realised this fact but the director just didn’t seem to want to give it up and milked it for all it was worth. You end up just willing it all to end.



The film comes to a believable conclusion but takes an inordinate amount of time getting there. It’s also immensely unsatisfying when it ends there. I for one would have liked to have seen Anna’s reaction to what they did or rather didn’t do, and would she have believed them?