Apart from the brilliant acting and excellent English accent American actress-Lake Bell puts up, everything else though funny seem to have been borne out of coincidence in Ben Palmer’s new romcom-Man Up, which pairs Bell (who plays Nancy) with British actor-Simon Pegg (who plays Jack).
Nancy, a thirty-something year old single woman is clothed in a Bridget Jones-type character—a woman has had no luck with love and has therefore given up to take refuge in drinking, munching junk foods and taking care of her cats. Beyond that, she manages to come out with a theory for every scenario—mostly, why things won’t work.
Set in London, the actual event which sets the film in motion takes place under the big Waterloo station clock where Nancy who was heading home for the 40th anniversary of her parents was mistaken by Jack for his 24 year old blind date.
Unable to quickly pour out words that she is not the person Jack was actually meeting and perhaps due to her own inability to meet a man, Nancy pretends to be Jack’s blind date and kick it off with a struggling conversation.
Soon, they dug deep into the famous London pub lifestyle, drinking many bottles of beer and glasses of shots which take them to Bowling, where another calculated coincidence take place. An event which threw Jack off the evening—an event so bad that Nancy’s cover was blown.
That must have been a bad coincidence for a date night which was going awkwardly so well but it was not just a mere coincidence that the two characters met the key architect of their ‘breakup’, he had a bigger role to play to give the movie a conventional ‘happy ending’…
Some of the elements put in to fetch laughter couldn’t even tickle; who actually thinks that spraying a fire extinguisher fume on someone was a funny joke to tell on screen? The film struggled at various parts but Nancy was brilliant in saving it from a great fall with her hilarious character.
It’s a romcom but I couldn’t catch any romance in there, except if you want to tell me that ‘screwing’ a man you mistaken met a few hours ago in the bathroom of your parents during an anniversary party with several folks out there in the living to climax a movie was the definition of romance (sorry for the spoiler).
Nevertheless, you can catch yourself laughing a lot if you don’t take note of the many coincidences which only become obvious after you’ve finished watching the movie.
Critic Rating: [yasr_overall_rating]
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mf0U9Yq60Hw