A Simple Favor (2018)

[Wiendish Fitch]

Based on the novel that's part of the Gone Girl knock-off bandwagon, this will be a slight change of pace for director Paul Feig. 

I did read the book, and... oh, my. I'm a little annoyed that they shaved a decade off the lead characters' ages (Stephanie and Emily are in their early '40s in the book), but I think Anna Kendrick might be good as Stephanie. Blake Lively has never elicited anything stronger than a "who cares?" from me, but she's getting positive buzz so far. It's funny how Lively's wardrobe in the movie is getting such massive praise, being that she's a woman and her character dresses in suits. Yeah, because women in suits (Colette) have never (Katharine Hepburn), ever (Marlene Dietrich) been a thing (Diane Keaton)! 

But disregard my hollow snark and let's discuss A Simple Favor for propers!

 

Edited September 10, 2018 by Wiendish Fitch

[cpcathy]

I actually want to see this, I need a good grown up film, so I hope this is it!

[Wishing Well]

I’m excited for the clothes.  Blake is a decent actress, but I really just love her more as a celebrity, and especially her CLOTHES.  I watched Age of Adeline specially for the outfits, and was not disappointed.

[Angeleyes]

We saw this tonight. I did not read the book ahead of time. I’d describe it as a dark comedy with a lot of twists and turns. It’s at times campy and over the top, but it worked. Our audience was constantly laughing, but we all seemed to be into the mystery of the plot as well. 

[Angeleyes]

Oh, and the clothes are definite goals in this movie. However, the movie managed to use that to define how extra each of the characters are and it made the clothes part of the jokes as well as to further the plot. 

I also loved the fancy house in this movie too. The kitchen and dining room chandelier are gorgeous. The movie also used the fanciness of the house (the art) as both a joke and a tool to further the plot. 

[SnarkEnthusiast]

I know the point of the movie was playing with different elements of thriller and comedy, but the last third and particularly the ending went from Gone Girls to Mean Girls in wackiness. I was expecting a movie similar to Searching which is the last film I saw in theaters, but in my opinion the campiness totally ruined the suspense. Especially the scene where Stephanie is talking to the detective, it's almost like Anna Kendrick was purposefully trying to channel her Pitch Perfect character or Bella Swan in terms of tryhard quirky awkwardness. Speaking of Bella, am I crazy or is the fancy house the same one they used for the Cullens in Twilight? Talk about a weird career callback for Anna Kendrick.

As a bisexual, I was very disappointed that the trailer would have you believe that there was sexual chemistry between Stephanie and Emily, but the kiss wasn't even a plot point. It was barely a throwaway scene for queerbaiting pandering that never comes up again. And while we're on the subject of misleading trailers, I've never read the book so I had no idea that a good 30% of the plot revolves around brother/sister incest? I'll take faux bisexuality over graphic sibling sex any day.

[Silver Raven]

I really enjoyed it.  I had no idea that there were going to be comedy elements in it, and I was happily surprised.  Interesting that Henry Golding was in this right after Crazy Rich Asians, I wonder if the buzz for that was what gave him this role.  The Greek chorus of moms (plus Andrew Rannels) was hilarious.  With the ending of Stephanie becoming a cold case investigator, I wouldn't mind seeing more of those.

I'm definitely not a prude, but I squirm when kid actors swear.  I hope their parents explain to them when and when not to use the words

[Miss Slay]

I hated this movie. It was so dumb and cheesy.

 

And I agree- what was the point of the incest? It never came up again? 

[Silver Raven]

57 minutes ago, Miss Slay said:

I hated this movie. It was so dumb and cheesy.

 

And I agree- what was the point of the incest? It never came up again? 

Uh.  You never heard the multiple times Emily called her "Brotherfucker"?

[Miss Slay]

30 minutes ago, Silver Raven said:

Uh.  You never heard the multiple times Emily called her "Brotherfucker"?

Yes, I did. But it wasn't a plot point. She simply called her brotherfucker. Did she black mail her? No. Did she imply that she killed her husband and brother? No.

It was a pointless plot point. 

[Angeleyes]

I think the only reason they put the incest plot point in was to create a red herring that Stephanie had a dark side and was therefore capable of murdering Emily or working with her in some form on the insurance scheme. 

[Irlandesa]

I went to see this movie because it had been getting good reviews and I'd heard all the "it's so twist" stuff being thrown at it.  I like twists if I'm surprised.  That's much harder to do these days because if you've read enough fiction (or seen enough soaps/crazy plot lifetime movies) it's pretty easy to figure out what the twists will be.  And that was true of this movie too.  Yes, there were a lot of turns but all along I felt a little ahead of the game.

But thankfully, that didn't really  matter in this movie because I was unprepared for how funny it would be. It was such a fun ride that I didn't really need surprise.  I didn't like the last third as much, not because it was campy (I kind of thought it had an element of camp throughout) but because the last third focused more on the plots and twists which meant less room for comedy.

On 9/13/2018 at 11:42 PM, Angeleyes said:

Oh, and the clothes are definite goals in this movie.

As much as Blake's clothes were praised in this movie, and they were great, the one outfit I left coveting was the one Anna Kendrick was wearing before she tried on Emma's black dress--it looked like a skirt with flowers and a polka dot top.

It's a good thing the comedy kept this afloat because I was left with a few questions like:

1) Given that we saw Emma murder her sister while trying to spin a lie that it was an accident, I guess we're to assume that it was an accurate depiction of what happened between them.  If so, that means their friendship was real and not some machiavellian pre-planning plot to set up this murder.  Huh.  I had a hard time getting a sense of Emma.  Is she just an opportunist--which the murder of her sister would seem to be?  Or was she hard core villain who wouldn't really care that much---which is what the very final moments seemed to suggest?

2)  At the end, we're told Stephanie is dating a guy in the city which suggests the relationship with Sean didn't work out.  However, the last vlog we see takes place six months after the craziness and she's still in Sean's kitchen.  So was she with him then but not later?  Did she somehow get the house?

As for the brotherfucker, while it could have probably played a bigger role, I do think it was still significant.  It gives shade to her character which helps explain why she'd jump in bed with her best friend's grieving spouse.  It's also the secret that no one else knows except Emma which helped convince Stephanie that Emma wasn't dead. 

[Silver Raven]

14 minutes ago, Irlandesa said:

2)  At the end, we're told Stephanie is dating a guy in the city which suggests the relationship with Sean didn't work out.  However, the last vlog we see takes place six months after the craziness and she's still in Sean's kitchen.  So was she with him then but not later?  Did she somehow get the house?

Well, I doubt if Henry got the $4 million, so he couldn't afford the house, and Stephanie sold out to Conde Nast, so I assumed she bought the place.

[Proclone]

17 hours ago, Irlandesa said:

It's a good thing the comedy kept this afloat because I was left with a few questions like:

1) Given that we saw Emma murder her sister while trying to spin a lie that it was an accident, I guess we're to assume that it was an accurate depiction of what happened between them.  If so, that means their friendship was real and not some machiavellian pre-planning plot to set up this murder.  Huh.  I had a hard time getting a sense of Emma.  Is she just an opportunist--which the murder of her sister would seem to be?  Or was she hard core villain who wouldn't really care that much---which is what the very final moments seemed to suggest?

2)  At the end, we're told Stephanie is dating a guy in the city which suggests the relationship with Sean didn't work out.  However, the last vlog we see takes place six months after the craziness and she's still in Sean's kitchen.  So was she with him then but not later?  Did she somehow get the house?

As for the brotherfucker, while it could have probably played a bigger role, I do think it was still significant.  It gives shade to her character which helps explain why she'd jump in bed with her best friend's grieving spouse.  It's also the secret that no one else knows except Emma which helped convince Stephanie that Emma wasn't dead. 

3

I think that Emily's "friendship" with Stephanie was real to a certain extent.  I think she liked Stephanie despite herself.  I actually think the whole incest thing played a part in that.  In her own different way, Stephanie was just as messed up as Emily, and I think Emily recognized that.  She was also using Stephanie for free child care, one of the parents comments, "[Stephaine] doesn't know she working for free."  So Emily was definitely manipulating Stephanie the entire time, but I don't think anything about her disappearance was pre-planned when she met Stephanie. I also do think Emily was a sociopath who liked or cared for anyone only insomuch as they were useful to her, so she only liked or cared for Stephanie to the point she got in her way, but I do think she did like Stephanie.  

 

17 hours ago, Silver Raven said:

Well, I doubt if Henry got the $4 million, so he couldn't afford the house, and Stephanie sold out to Conde Nast, so I assumed she bought the place.

Given that Emily wasn't dead, no, I doubt Sean got any money.  It also says in the text at the end that he and Nicky were living in Californa, so I would assume that Stephanie did indeed buy the house.  Given how much she coveted it, it makes sense.

I saw this the other night and I enjoyed the heck out of it.  I was a little hesitant at first, I really like Anna Kendrick, but the previews made it seem like it could go either way and be very good or terrible.  I'm glad it fell on the very good side.  I thought it was fun and funny while still having the dark undercurrent of a thriller.  I thought Kendrick and Lively were excellent and had great chemistry with each other.  Henry Goulding is also very good, and I'm surprised it's just his second movie.

I liked all the characters or at least found them compelling.  And I've seen several people comment that Stephanie's relationship with her brother doesn't play a role in the plot, but I think it just adds a layer to the thriller aspect of the movie.  None of these characters are what they seem.  And as I said above, I also think it's part of the reason Emily and Stephanie connect.  It's also part of the reason that Stephanie is so desperately lonely and why she strives to be super mom.  She feels guilty because of her brother and husband's death.  She wants to make her son's life perfect because she's the reason his father isn't there.  That all plays into how Stephanie gets caught up in Emily's web and therefore is integral to the plot. 

Edited September 16, 2018 by Proclone

[phalange]

I enjoyed the mystery and all the twists, and that it ended up being a very dark comedy. The background that we got about Stephanie was, I think, mainly to make the audience think she was capable of doing something extreme, and to show that there was really no hero of the story. Emily, Sean, and Stephanie were all screwed up.

When the detective mentioned that the body found in the lake showed signs of heroin use, I started wondering if it was really Emily and if there might be a twin. Considering how controlling and abusive their father was, and how indifferent their mother seemed, the girls never really stood a chance, but damn, they were a special level of crazy. 

All the info that was given at the end was great, especially Emily really fitting in while in prison, Sean's next book being titled The Oopsy Jar, and Stephanie becoming a part-time investigator. 

[SnarkEnthusiast]

On 9/15/2018 at 6:42 PM, Silver Raven said:

I'm definitely not a prude, but I squirm when kid actors swear.  I hope their parents explain to them when and when not to use the words

For me, it's not a pearl clutching thing as much as I think the clunkiness of making child actors curse ruins the dialogue because it's such an obvious cheap ploy to get the audience to laugh or a really lazy way of communicating the adult character's shitty parenting. When you make six or seven-year-olds say fuck, the line almost never sounds natural because they obviously have no familiarity with the context of the word or the emotion behind it. Or you get older kids like the kids from Stranger Things who know cuss words and take glee out of being allowed to say them because they're still young enough to be forbidden from swearing and still feel like they're getting away with something. Long story short, it never works for me because they're either too young to be intentionally using those words in everyday vocabulary or In that in between stage where they think swearing makes them rebellious and cool. Any way you slice it, it's pretty insignificant but still annoying.

On 9/15/2018 at 7:52 PM, Miss Slay said:

I hated this movie. It was so dumb and cheesy.

 

And I agree- what was the point of the incest? It never came up again? 

It definitely suffers from tonal dissonance. It was marketed as a kind of Gone Girl for suburban moms, and in my opinion when they stuck to that formula it was great, but there were other random scenes in the middle where it became Mean Girls, Bad Moms, and Pitch Perfect. I understand wanting to differentiate it from Gone Girl, but they should've kept the comedy dark to be more cohesive with the thriller theme. Suddenly being expected to giggle at parents mocking Stephanie or Stephanie struggling to unzip a dress in the middle of all these other intense mystery and murder and sex scenes just made me feel like I was flipping the channel in between multiple different movies. (Not to mention Emily's Regina George ending)

On 9/15/2018 at 10:01 PM, Angeleyes said:

I think the only reason they put the incest plot point in was to create a red herring that Stephanie had a dark side and was therefore capable of murdering Emily or working with her in some form on the insurance scheme. 

Right and re: your question @Miss Slay I think it was just to highlight the film's overall theme that you don't really know anyone and that everyone has something to hide. When you look at Stephanie, you see a super wholesome, prudish PTA queen mom who you'd probably think spends all her free time organizing field trips and looking up cookie recipes on Pinterest. I don't think there's an exact profile for someone who would be inclined to start up a consensual incestuous sexual relationship with your sibling unless you've both been through a horrible shared trauma or raised in total isolation together a la Blue Lagoon or Flowers in the Attic, but if there was a profile, it definitely wouldn't be Stephanie. Incest is one of the most stigmatized social taboos, especially between siblings and especially if you went in knowing you were related. Stephanie has to hide not only her sexual attraction to her brother, but the fact that they consummated it. That's a tremendous amount of psychological stress and shame to be carrying around, which is only exacerbated by the fact that because of the stigma, she can't talk about it with anyone. Plus, her husband's suspicion and the heavy implication that the affair was not only ongoing, but her brother fathered her child (gross) caused the collapse of her marriage and likely contributed to the car crash that caused both of them to die. Emily is a master manipulator and correctly guessed that Stephanie had something she needed to get off her chest. When that guilt is mixed with alcohol and Stephanie predictably being a huge light weight and not a day drinker, the confession was inevitable.

Now, that plot point is a fascinating character study and an awesome gateway for an exploration of human psychology. Unfortunately, all we got was "brotherfucker" added to every fourth line of dialogue because the writers apparently thought seventh grade taunts were peak comedy. That was a huge missed opportunity to augment the twisted thriller aspects of the movie and solidify its genre imo. You can't just go "Our main character is so emotionally damaged and craving validation that she knowingly had sex with her brother.......HILARIOUS!!!"

Edited September 18, 2018 by SnarkEnthusiast

[Shannon L.]

On 9/17/2018 at 6:44 PM, SnarkEnthusiast said:

I understand wanting to differentiate it from Gone Girl, but they should've kept the comedy dark to be more cohesive with the thriller theme. Suddenly being expected to giggle at parents mocking Stephanie or Stephanie struggling to unzip a dress in the middle of all these other intense mystery and murder and sex scenes just made me feel like I was flipping the channel in between multiple different movies.

Thank you!  I did enjoy the movie for the most part, but something felt off about it and I couldn't quite explain it.  You just did.  That's what I think was wrong, too.  There was dark comedy, then there was silly stuff thrown in and, for me, the movie didn't flow quite as well as it could have because of it. 

I suck at predicting movies, even the simplest of plot twists escape me many times, but I'd heard the term "big plot twist!" and found a little let down by this one.  I hadn't thought of a twin (duh), but when that turned out to be the case, my thought was basically "Oh, yeah. That makes sense".  Not "woah!" like I'd expected it to be. 

[SnarkEnthusiast]

1 hour ago, Shannon L. said:

Thank you!  I did enjoy the movie for the most part, but something felt off about it and I couldn't quite explain it.  You just did.  That's what I think was wrong, too.  There was dark comedy, then there was silly stuff thrown in and, for me, the movie didn't flow quite as well as it could have because of it. 

I suck at predicting movies, even the simplest of plot twists escape me many times, but I'd heard the term "big plot twist!" and found a little let down by this one.  I hadn't thought of a twin (duh), but when that turned out to be the case, my thought was basically "Oh, yeah. That makes sense".  Not "woah!" like I'd expected it to be. 

You're so welcome! Haha. I hadn't thought of twin, but I knew as soon as they found the body it wasn't Emily because that'd be too easy and the face looked too rough to be her. Searching did "huge suspenseful plot twist" multiple times much more effectively imo, so I spoiled my own expectations unintentionally by seeing Searching a week before this one. I was expecting something cleverer. 

[Ms Blue Jay]

On 9/15/2018 at 2:07 PM, SnarkEnthusiast said:

 And while we're on the subject of misleading trailers, I've never read the book so I had no idea that a good 30% of the plot revolves around brother/sister incest? I'll take faux bisexuality over graphic sibling sex any day.

So after this subplot that @SnarkEnthusiast mentions was revealed I started to feel sooooooooooooo sick.  I came home, and I felt sick the entire night.  I'm not kidding.  It was like being food poisoned.  I really couldn't get past it.  It really ruined the movie for me.

Blake Lively was great, the clothes were great.  I'm really grateful to Paul Feig for making Henry Golding the love interest.  That was incredible.  And I loved Emily and Sean's kid too.  I actually screamed with laughter when he swore.  The timing and shock of it was hilarious to me.

I'd be so happy with the movie if the incest plot was scrapped out.  Sean, Emily, and Nicky were just so much fun to watch.  (Even though I understand Emily wasn't 'all there'.)  

Edited September 19, 2018 by Ms Blue Jay

[JessePinkman]

I've watched too many soap operas because the twin twist is the biggest most lazy story cop-out of all time and I'm sick of seeing it.

That said, I like the first half of this movie a lot. A LOT. I thought tonally it made sense, the music was great, the directing and editing was weird and different. And Blake Lively had some serious BDE. Like woah. Who knew she could be so charismatic?

How did Emily go half her life without her picture being taken? She was a marketing executive for a seemingly well known designer. I'm sure they've done press events with her there.

Also once she decided to frame Sean for abusing her, how was she going to escape the arson charge? Her face is everywhere now and the police know who she is.

And this is nitpicky but why did Anna Kendrick get to play her 17 year old self but Blake Lively was played by two (?) actresses who look nothing like her?

[SnarkEnthusiast]

2 hours ago, Ms Blue Jay said:

So after this subplot that @SnarkEnthusiast mentions was revealed I started to feel sooooooooooooo sick.  I came home, and I felt sick the entire night.  I'm not kidding.  It was like being food poisoned.  I really couldn't get past it.  It really ruined the movie for me.

I'd be so happy with the movie if the incest plot was scrapped out.  Sean, Emily, and Nicky were just so much fun to watch.  (Even though I understand Emily wasn't 'all there'.)  

Incest is just kind of a lazy way to make any book or movie automatically darker or more twisted without actually having to write anything or be creative. Given that most cases of incest are rape or child molestation, I'm sure actual incest survivors don't appreciate when it's portrayed as consensual and some sort of Romeo and Juliet style forbidden love affair. Like…there's a reason it isn't accepted by society....they're siblings...you can literally pick anyone else on Earth lol. Also again it was just really cheap shock value that added nothing to the suspense or the plot. They spent a distressing amount of time fleshing it out (no pun intended) and the only payoff was Emily's nickname. It didn't really work as a red herring because they relied too much on making Stephanie an oblivious, naive narrator to suddenly reveal her as a murderous double agent. She just wound up being an emotionally disturbed woman who had sex with her brother (...because he reminded her of their dead dad...? truly an incest turducken), which was very unsatisfying and didn't jive with her characterization the majority of the movie as a zany comic relief character.

1 hour ago, JessePinkman said:

Blake Lively had some serious BDE. Like woah. Who knew she could be so charismatic?

And this is nitpicky but why did Anna Kendrick get to play her 17 year old self but Blake Lively was played by two (?) actresses who look nothing like her?

I know! She played suave sexually ambiguous temptress very well.

Even though Anna Kendrick and Blake Lively are around the same age, Anna Kendrick has the same mousy, demure teenage look that she had in Twilight. Honestly I think the only reason Blake didn't play her teenage self is because they wanted to cast actual twins for the flashbacks.  

[Ms Blue Jay]

Totally agree with you @SnarkEnthusiast.  

[SnarkEnthusiast]

2 minutes ago, Ms Blue Jay said:

Totally agree with you @SnarkEnthusiast.  

My friend pointed out that the sibling affair was the catalyst for the car crash, which is true and I guess why it was included because it was the trigger that pissed off her husband. Still, it was barely mentioned and they didn't necessarily need a back story for the car crash because accidents happen at random all the time. Don't you hate it when an argument about you boning your brother inadvertently kills half your remaining kin? How many people have been killed in incest related automobile accidents? LOL 

[afterbite]

My primary problem with the incest portion is that there was no real pay-off. There should have been a point where that secret was revealed outside of the Emily and Stephanie circle. It was just one element of the nonsensical ending, though. Mousy little Stephanie clearly coveted everything Stephanie had, including her house, her wardrobe, her husband, and her cocky, nonchalant way of moving through the world. She isn't a heroine in this story. She absolutely was moving in on Emily's life, becoming the lite version of Emily 2.0. Maybe she spent a few days sad that Emily wasn't around, but the search and the posters, etc., were all about her. She thoroughly enjoyed stepping in to support the grieving husband. She parlayed it all into success via her vlog. It became a battle of wits, and she wanted to win. The problem is that the evolution felt rushed. She went from wine-date mommy friend to clever schemer without enough there to support it.

All of this culminates into backstab after backstab, with her as the triumphant winner. She defeats the master and catapults herself into fame and fortune. The problem I had with it, though, was that, story-telling wise, she didn't earn it. I couldn't celebrate with her at the end because she wasn't dastardly enough to win my affection. She was kind of inept and clumsy and awkward while also being not a very good person, and I didn't want her to win. If anything, I would have preferred an ending where she and Emily conspired together to frame and/or murder the husband to their mutual enrichment, with the movie showing that they'd then locked themselves into an ongoing battle full of distrust and manipulation and conniving - an uneasy, destined to implode in a dramatic fashion kind of sociopathic partnership. That's what Stephanie had earned, in a cosmic sense. Not a victory.

Anyway, I thought the ending was abysmal. I hated it. In a surprise, Lively had enough swagger to almost make me forgive the tired psycho bisexual trope. I'd estimate that the movie was maybe only 65% as good as it possibly could have been.

[Ms Blue Jay]

I thought Stephanie's transformation at the end was weird.  The last 15 minutes or so kind of threw everything.  She was so damn smug.  I don't think it made sense.

I'll put the rest in spoilers just in case.

Spoiler

 

1.  Too quick / not enough explanation for why she switched over and wanted to catch Emily.
2.  She just smugly stands there while Sean is shot?

Why did Emily even do the confession if she knew it was a set up?  This was to throw Stephanie and Sean off the fact that she knew - only to reveal that she knew four seconds later?

Also, if Stephanie revealed the vlog camera thing, Emily could have done more things than simply run away.  She could have hurt or shot Stephanie THEN run away.  She could have turned off the camera, or smacked it away, then run away.  Nobody would know where she was, even if it was live streaming.  It's like the camera reveal was so shocking to her that it threw her off from how smart she normally is?

 

Edited September 19, 2018 by Ms Blue Jay

[WhosThatGirl]

I liked this until the last 15 mins. I did not read the book but I thought it was a funny satire on Gone Girl which was an okay movie to me but we all have to admit it was also ridiculous. 

Heres the thing:

Spoiler

First off the incest stuff is gross and disgusting and adds nothing to the plot of the movie. Like I don’t understand why it was there. And also I agree with everyone else nothing came from it? I’m surprised Emily didn’t reveal it during the final showdown with Stephanie and Sean. 

 

Ikind of wish that the ending has not been so ridiculous. I thought it would have been a fun ending to have both Emily and Stephanie working together to frame Sean instead of the odd happily ever after. That’s a great ending to the satire they were trying to make.

To me it was a stupid ending having Emily crawling on the ground after being run over.. like I’m sorry that was just stupid and dumb? It just...was stupid. It was like a bad skit. I get satire, clever satire which this movie was kind of.. and then it started getting to meta and it just didn’t work.

Granted I didn’t read the book so the book more than likely ends this way, I just think it would have been more interesting to have Emily and Stephanie conquering it all and still being best friends and throwing Sean under the bus. I mean yeah sucks for him but he’s useless and this movie was never really about him that much anyway and both Emily and Stephanie are crazy pants so I wish the ending we got was them on some talk show together and talking about their great friendship and how both Stephanie and Emily were “conned” by Sean. That would have been really fun.

Edited September 23, 2018 by WhosThatGirl

[StatisticalOutlier]

On 9/15/2018 at 8:01 PM, Irlandesa said:

As much as Blake's clothes were praised in this movie, and they were great, the one outfit I left coveting was the one Anna Kendrick was wearing before she tried on Emma's black dress--it looked like a skirt with flowers and a polka dot top.

The top wasn't just polka dots--they were actual little balls:

http://www.gotceleb.com/wp-content/uploads/photos/anna-kendrick/on-set-of-a-simple-favor-in-toronto/Anna-Kendrick:-On-set-of-A-Simple-Favor-in-Toronto--01.jpg

I loved it, but it seemed out of character (compared to her earlier denim skirt with a sweater tucked in).  So I wondered if she "borrowed" it from Emily's closet, but it didn't look like Emily's style, either.  And you said she wore it before trying on the black dress.  Oh well--mox nix.  It was super cute.

[WhosThatGirl]

31 minutes ago, StatisticalOutlier said:

The top wasn't just polka dots--they were actual little balls:

http://www.gotceleb.com/wp-content/uploads/photos/anna-kendrick/on-set-of-a-simple-favor-in-toronto/Anna-Kendrick:-On-set-of-A-Simple-Favor-in-Toronto--01.jpg

I loved it, but it seemed out of character (compared to her earlier denim skirt with a sweater tucked in).  So I wondered if she "borrowed" it from Emily's closet, but it didn't look like Emily's style, either.  And you said she wore it before trying on the black dress.  Oh well--mox nix.  It was super cute.

I loved that too too. Also on the topic of fashion in this movie, I also loved Emily’s pinstriped suit (possibly a jumpsuit?) during the first time she and Stephanie had martinis.

[methodwriter85]

I loved how Emily wore this 1950's style dress at the end- it clearly felt like something she thought someone like Stephanie would wear even though it wasn't really. It felt like her interpretation of Stephanie's Donna Reed persona.

[Ms Blue Jay]

Fashion articles imply the whole look was supposed to be a Hitchcockian homage.

[tennisgurl]

I mostly thought this was a really fun thriller, but with two noticeable flaws. For one thing, I dont think we needed the incest backstory for Stephanie. Or, at least, it wasn't used very well. I think the main character of a movie, especially a sweet mommy blogger type, having a consensual sexual encounter with her brother (that might have been ongoing, and produced her son!) is a pretty big freaking deal, and if they are going to throw it out there, it needs a lot of follow up. Especially considering the brother showed up after her father died, and was apparently the spitting imagine of him. So, a brother fucker with an Elektra complex? Sounds compelling, if very dark, but we dont get much about it. Just the idea that everywhere, no matter what they appear to be, can have dark secrets. Really, I either wanted the incest to be more dealt with, or not used, and have the brother and husband be fighting about something else when they died. 

The second flaw was the ending. The movie to that point did a good job walking the line between thriller and comedy, but that seemed to go so hard for wacky comedy, that the drama lost its punch. Emily crawling around after being run over by Elijah from Girls after her giving a full on super-villain monologue was just over the top ridiculous, followed by this super happy ending. It just made the movie lose its bite at the end.

But, I still am glad that I saw this movie. I thought that Kendrick, Lively, and Golding were all very compelling, especially Lively. I've thought she was a talented and interesting actress since she was in The Town, and she really showed a flare from drama, as well as dark comedy, here. She almost seems like a deconstruction of a Hitchcock blog, especially in her 1950s get up at the end. Icy and seemingly untouchable victim, but in actually, isnt the victim, but the mastermind. She was so watchable, that when she "died", I just kept wanting her to come back. 

I also enjoyed how ambiguous the three main characters were, and how many ways you could read their actions. Did Emily ever care about Stephanie or Sean, or were they a means to an end? Did Sean love Stephanie, or was he using her to deal with his grief, like he told Emily? How much was his idea, and how much did he know or suspect? Did Stephanie really like Emily so much, or was she jealous of her glamorous life? She did seem quick to move into her dead friends house (and bed) awfully quickly after her death. Or maybe all those things are true at the same time? 

I had such clothing envy! Not only Emily's fabulous wardrobe, but I liked some of Stephanies clothes later on as well. So many great outfits, I cant even!

[WhosThatGirl]

12 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

I mostly thought this was a really fun thriller, but with two noticeable flaws. For one thing, I dont think we needed the incest backstory for Stephanie. Or, at least, it wasn't used very well. I think the main character of a movie, especially a sweet mommy blogger type, having a consensual sexual encounter with her brother (that might have been ongoing, and produced her son!) is a pretty big freaking deal, and if they are going to throw it out there, it needs a lot of follow up. Especially considering the brother showed up after her father died, and was apparently the spitting imagine of him. So, a brother fucker with an Elektra complex? Sounds compelling, if very dark, but we dont get much about it. Just the idea that everywhere, no matter what they appear to be, can have dark secrets. Really, I either wanted the incest to be more dealt with, or not used, and have the brother and husband be fighting about something else when they died. 

The second flaw was the ending. The movie to that point did a good job walking the line between thriller and comedy, but that seemed to go so hard for wacky comedy, that the drama lost its punch. Emily crawling around after being run over by Elijah from Girls after her giving a full on super-villain monologue was just over the top ridiculous, followed by this super happy ending. It just made the movie lose its bite at the end.

But, I still am glad that I saw this movie. I thought that Kendrick, Lively, and Golding were all very compelling, especially Lively. I've thought she was a talented and interesting actress since she was in The Town, and she really showed a flare from drama, as well as dark comedy, here. She almost seems like a deconstruction of a Hitchcock blog, especially in her 1950s get up at the end. Icy and seemingly untouchable victim, but in actually, isnt the victim, but the mastermind. She was so watchable, that when she "died", I just kept wanting her to come back. 

I also enjoyed how ambiguous the three main characters were, and how many ways you could read their actions. Did Emily ever care about Stephanie or Sean, or were they a means to an end? Did Sean love Stephanie, or was he using her to deal with his grief, like he told Emily? How much was his idea, and how much did he know or suspect? Did Stephanie really like Emily so much, or was she jealous of her glamorous life? She did seem quick to move into her dead friends house (and bed) awfully quickly after her death. Or maybe all those things are true at the same time? 

I had such clothing envy! Not only Emily's fabulous wardrobe, but I liked some of Stephanies clothes later on as well. So many great outfits, I cant even!

I know. There were a lot of questions I had and it’s why I wish the movie had ended differently.

I definitely loved all the clothes. I feel like that was my favorite thing. 

[methodwriter85]

I didn't really the book, but this review talks about it:

 

Honestly, they should have gone with the book ending. I also really like the idea of how Hope dies in the book.

But whatever. I imagine that Emily does her 20 years, and then gets out and manages to do very well for herself after writing several best-selling memoirs. She strikes me as someone who will always manage to come out on top no matter what. She then proceeds to make life hell for whatever wife (or husband?) her son gets to have.

Edited October 1, 2018 by methodwriter85

[Ms Blue Jay]

On 9/29/2018 at 4:04 PM, tennisgurl said:

I also enjoyed how ambiguous the three main characters were, and how many ways you could read their actions. Did Emily ever care about Stephanie or Sean, or were they a means to an end? Did Sean love Stephanie, or was he using her to deal with his grief, like he told Emily? How much was his idea, and how much did he know or suspect? Did Stephanie really like Emily so much, or was she jealous of her glamorous life? She did seem quick to move into her dead friends house (and bed) awfully quickly after her death. Or maybe all those things are true at the same time? 

I liked how one thing was truly unambiguous, which was that Emily loved her son so much.  That I really believed.  I don't even know if Blake showed that much emotion on 6 seasons of Gossip Girl.

Everything else though, was maybe TOO ambiguous for me.  Was Sean only sexually obsessed with Emily? He got over her too quick.  And did Emily even give a damn about Sean?  She had no problem shooting him.  So weird.  And yeah, Stephanie was also a sociopath.

The part from the ending that annoyed me the most was Stephanie's energy.  Did not make sense at all.  She was very happy and placid through all the shootings.

[WhosThatGirl]

1 hour ago, Ms Blue Jay said:

I liked how one thing was truly unambiguous, which was that Emily loved her son so much.  That I really believed.  I don't even know if Blake showed that much emotion on 6 seasons of Gossip Girl.

Everything else though, was maybe TOO ambiguous for me.  Was Sean only sexually obsessed with Emily? He got over her too quick.  And did Emily even give a damn about Sean?  She had no problem shooting him.  So weird.  And yeah, Stephanie was also a sociopath.

The part from the ending that annoyed me the most was Stephanie's energy.  Did not make sense at all.  She was very happy and placid through all the shootings.

Blake was pretty good in the first season of Gossip Girl. And some of the second season. Then I think she just became over the show (as did a lot of the cast it seems like) and I think wanted to be able to do other things but I she was locked into this character. I recently actually did a rewatch of gossip girl(tried to, I couldn’t make it past the second season) and she’s pretty good in the first season.

Yeah, they really were only clear about Emily’s love for Nicky. But I found Emily and Blake’s playing of her fine and good. I agree with you that Stephanie was all over the place throughout the entire movie. She was manic in a lot of scenes when she shouldn’t be and too calm in scenes that didn’t make sense. I don’t know if that was writing or if that was Anna Kendrick’s way of playing her? There were times where I thought Anna was miscast here.

[Ms Blue Jay]

I happen to be a big fan of GG and wasn't denigrating the show.  I think S1 and S2 are marvelous.  But I also think she's grown a lot as an actor from there to here.  I don't know, maybe it's just been a while since my latest rewatch.  

Edited October 2, 2018 by Ms Blue Jay

[WhosThatGirl]

2 hours ago, Ms Blue Jay said:

I happen to be a big fan of GG and wasn't denigrating the show.  I think S1 and S2 are marvelous.  But I also think she's grown a lot as an actor from there to here.  I don't know, maybe it's just been a while since my latest rewatch.  

The first two seasons are great but the rest doesn’t hold up that well honestly. Also I loved it at the time too, but I think like a lot of teen dramas it lost its way. 

But I really do think she was great in this and like I said I’m not sure about Anna who I also really really enjoy, Something felt off about her in this role.

[Scarlett45]

I saw the movie and loved it! As always they are going to have Blake Lively wearing the best clothes, Henry Golding is hot and the little boy playing their son was ADORABLE. His quote “no one looks like Mom....” I knew she couldn’t be dead because (duh no movie) so I figured she had an identical twin (hence the DNA would come back). 

The makeup to make Emily into Faith was well done, gorgeous genes can get ruined with alcohol and drugs. Her body in the lake for several days also would explained a slightly altered appearance. 

 

What Faith didn’t get is when she mentioned Nikky, it was game over. Threaten a woman’s child and you are likely to die. 

On 10/2/2018 at 11:52 AM, Ms Blue Jay said:

I liked how one thing was truly unambiguous, which was that Emily loved her son so much.  That I really believed.  I don't even know if Blake showed that much emotion on 6 seasons of Gossip Girl.

Everything else though, was maybe TOO ambiguous for me.  Was Sean only sexually obsessed with Emily? He got over her too quick.  And did Emily even give a damn about Sean?  She had no problem shooting him.  So weird.  And yeah, Stephanie was also a sociopath.

The part from the ending that annoyed me the most was Stephanie's energy.  Did not make sense at all.  She was very happy and placid through all the shootings.

Bolded- me too. When Emily said the best thing she could do for him would be to kill herself I figured she would frame her death for the insurance money....

 

I think Emily was still attracted to Sean but had no respect for him. She was okay staying with him but if he was collateral damage- alright. 

Sean LIKED Stephanie, and I think of Emily was really dead that could’ve grown into something more. (Maybe......grief sex is a thing) Stephanie was jealous of Emily’s glamourous life, and was attracted to Sean (I mean he’s gorgeous), she was also a single mom who was lonely, horny and she felt needed in that scenario. 

Why do you think Stephanie was a sociopath? Wasn’t she trying to uncover the truth and make sure Emily went to jail? She wasn’t actually going to hurt Sean. 

Edited October 6, 2018 by Scarlett45

[Ms Blue Jay]

When Emily shot Sean in the shoulder for real, Stephanie was acting totally manic and cool with it.  And she was all too keen on joining in on Emily's plan to frame Sean.  She was switching between loyalties to Sean and Emily like whiplash.  I'm on Sean's side!  Now I'm on Emily's!  I'm back on Sean's again.  With no explanation or buildup.  She was just a pawn in the story, and her motivation was hard to figure, whereas Emily's was clear cut.

5 hours ago, Scarlett45 said:

I saw the movie and loved it! As always they are going to have Blake Lively wearing the best clothes, Henry Golding is hot and the little boy playing their son was ADORABLE. His quote “no one looks like Mom...."

I loved that quote too.  Even though the media hype over Blake annoys the hell out of me, he's right.

Edited October 6, 2018 by Ms Blue Jay

[jmcd44]

So I did read the book & the ending is so different that it felt like a different story. Also I told my friends that it is a real testament to Anna Kendrick’s charm that anyone liked Stephanie. Her character in the book was the WORST. And the incest plot line is a bigger deal. I was Team Emily all the way. 

[TinkerPig]

I really need help here, at the beginning of the movie when you see the movie making companies logos, after the Lionsgate logo, there's a logo of a company that I just loved. It's an image of Alice hiding the garden scissors behind her back. I just CAN'T REMEMBER the company name. Please help me and earn heaven. 

[coppersin]

52 minutes ago, TinkerPig said:

I really need help here, at the beginning of the movie when you see the movie making companies logos, after the Lionsgate logo, there's a logo of a company that I just loved. It's an image of Alice hiding the garden scissors behind her back. I just CAN'T REMEMBER the company name. Please help me and earn heaven. 

I haven't seen this movie yet but I think you're referring to the Feigco logo:

[LittleFishDuhDuh]

On 20/09/2018 at 5:08 AM, afterbite said:

My primary problem with the incest portion is that there was no real pay-off. There should have been a point where that secret was revealed outside of the Emily and Stephanie circle. It was just one element of the nonsensical ending, though. Mousy little Stephanie clearly coveted everything Stephanie had, including her house, her wardrobe, her husband, and her cocky, nonchalant way of moving through the world. She isn't a heroine in this story. She absolutely was moving in on Emily's life, becoming the lite version of Emily 2.0. Maybe she spent a few days sad that Emily wasn't around, but the search and the posters, etc., were all about her. She thoroughly enjoyed stepping in to support the grieving husband. She parlayed it all into success via her vlog. It became a battle of wits, and she wanted to win. The problem is that the evolution felt rushed. She went from wine-date mommy friend to clever schemer without enough there to support it.

All of this culminates into backstab after backstab, with her as the triumphant winner. She defeats the master and catapults herself into fame and fortune. The problem I had with it, though, was that, story-telling wise, she didn't earn it. I couldn't celebrate with her at the end because she wasn't dastardly enough to win my affection. She was kind of inept and clumsy and awkward while also being not a very good person, and I didn't want her to win. If anything, I would have preferred an ending where she and Emily conspired together to frame and/or murder the husband to their mutual enrichment, with the movie showing that they'd then locked themselves into an ongoing battle full of distrust and manipulation and conniving - an uneasy, destined to implode in a dramatic fashion kind of sociopathic partnership. That's what Stephanie had earned, in a cosmic sense. Not a victory.

Anyway, I thought the ending was abysmal. I hated it. In a surprise, Lively had enough swagger to almost make me forgive the tired psycho bisexual trope. I'd estimate that the movie was maybe only 65% as good as it possibly could have been.

You said how i felt so well. Just finished watching and i hate Anna Kenrick’s character. Was disappointed at the common ending/route the movie takes! I wish blake should just shoot her when she found out she is streamed. That would have been a somewhat nicer ending. Sad to say the movie’s plot twists are pretty lazy, boring and quite common, i’m just not surprised :/ plus point of this movie: the french songs, and blade’s wardrobes 

[Anela]

I liked it, for the most part. I liked Stephanie, until she was so happy and eager to move into that house, and throw out Emily's things. At that point, I was telling my dad, "He's a freak, and she's stupid" after I'd said, "These people are freaky". I thought there was a twin, and that she'd killed her sister, but still: this guy obviously didn't give a shit about his wife, and just liked having a pretty woman around, taking care of his son, his house, and cooking dinner every night. 

I thought it stretched out a bit too long, but other than the above, I thought Stephanie was clever. Posting the vlog, and pissing off Emily, then live-streaming her confession, and her almost killing them. 

My dad enjoyed it, until he had to go to bed. I think it went on a bit too long for him, too. 

[aradia22]

I didn't go into this with any expectations even though Paul Feig and Anna Kendrick had me suspecting this might be a comedy. My issue is less that I was sold something and then presented with something different and more that this movie had the potential to be funnier than it was. The thing I thought of watching this movie was that Kristen Wiig/Will Ferrell Lifetime movie. That is, it's a genre savvy movie that fails at being funny because for the most part it just does the same thing as those other movies without using its genre savvy as an opportunity for comedy. That and there were just opportunities to lean into awkwardness that weren't played up so they would only be funny if you laugh at cringey stuff. Like, I don't know. I just kept feeling like there was space to play a scene or deliver a line to elicit a laugh and the movie was too scared of being outright comedic to go for it. Also, a total waste of Andrew Rannells until the very end.

As for the twists and mystery, I didn't hate them but I didn't love them. The whole movie was too long but once it got going towards the end, it did build up tension nicely as the mystery unraveled. 

Spoiler

The twin thing was pretty obvious after a certain point but I didn't see the incest secret coming. Mostly because... why? And I definitely didn't see the husband intentionally causing the car accident coming. 

Henry Golding was fine but I still haven't seen Crazy Rich Asians and at least from this movie, I didn't see any star quality. Also, all the sex scenes got a bit boring. They felt unnecessary. I feel like this movie wasn't enough of a thriller for those to be very sexy or titillating scenes. And there was something repetitive about it, like after x amount of time there would be something they thought was mildly salacious. So maybe I'm too jaded to be very impressed but also there was no chemistry between the actors to make anything come across as very sexy. 

While I had similar problems with the ending, I did like the part about her blog morphing into a kind of amateur detective agency. While the plotting against Blake Lively's character was hit or miss, I did believe in her competency (for someone with no experience) in ferreting out the truth. 

[Avabelle]

This is on Netflix so saw it last night. It was good but like many others I wasn’t routing For Stephanie whatsoever. For as much as she went on about how her and Emily were besties, she hooked up with her husband the day of her funeral and was moved in playing housewife and mommy within weeks. She literally danced around clearing out her “best friends” closet. She wasn’t a murderer so she’s not as bad as Emily but she was still a bit of a dickhead so her smugness toward Sean and Emily was really frustrating at the end. 

[Kel Varnsen]

Watched this tonight because my wife and I were out of shows and it looked interesting. We both liked it a lot. The mix of humour and mystery really worked. Plus it again proved something I have thought that Paul Feig should only direct R rated movies.

Also it was funny how they used Stephanie's videos and how each one had significantly more viewers.

[BetterButter]

‘A Simple Favor’ Sequel Set With Anna Kendrick, Blake Lively & Paul Feig Returning For Amazon Studios & Lionsgate

[AimingforYoko]

They'll probably have Emily escape from prison by manipulating some lovelorn guard on the verge of retirement.  Pfft, how unrealistic. 

[BetterButter]

‘A Simple Favor 2’ Is a Go: Anna Kendrick, Blake Lively Returning for Paul Feig Sequel