Just Friends (2005)
When I tell you Just Friends is terrible, it’s not just an attempt to expunge my sorrow; it’s a public service announcement. This profoundly misguided, predictable so-called comedy might actually be harmful.
In high school, Chris (Ryan Reynolds) was an overweight wimp pining for his best friend Jamie (Amy Smart) but got stuck in the friend zone. After leaving town for ten years, losing weight, and becoming handsome, Chris gets stuck in his hometown over the Christmas Holiday while promoting ditzy pop star Samantha James (Anna Faris). He sees this misfortune as an opportunity to get the girl he never had.
If it’s been 10 years and you’re still dreaming of “the one that got away”, you’re not a romantic. You're a creep. It’s time to move on. Either accept the relationship you two have and stay friends, or break it off. Don’t keep putting friendship coins in the machine hoping sex will come out. It’s not going to. Not only are you a bad friend for believing this, but you're also a weasel. Unless you live in the universe in which Just Friends takes place. From the beginning, this film was doomed. The premise is inherently bad. And that’s just the beginning.
Everyone in this picture is an empty-headed moron. No one acts like a human being. Humans communicate with words. The people of Just Friends convey their thoughts with ludicrous slapstick, romantic comedy clichés, and contrived developments. That’s when they’re not destroying their surroundings, hitting another person in the face, or watching Chris receive yet another testicle injury. I sat stone-faced while this picture unfolded. Beneath this abomination of a script, you can kind of make out the comedic talents of Ryan Reynolds and Anna Faris, but they are dog-paddling in the middle of a shark-infested ocean, praying someone will throw them a flotation device.
Just Friends barely feels like a real movie. Here I am, minutes after it’s over and I can’t figure out where my time went. It sure felt longer than an hour and thirty-four minutes but there are only 5 sentences worth of a story in what I saw. Everything else is an improbably assembled comedy of errors that amounts to nothing. It’s all desperation, and you can tell no one thought this was going to sell. Repeatedly, it resorts to one of my most hated and creatively bankrupt wannabe gags, that old schtick where kids swear and say inappropriate things. Someone was paid to write this?
It’s like a checklist of everything bad that can happen in a rom-com. Just Friends makes you want to drown yourself in curdled milk. Bad singing, masturbation jokes, parents who misunderstand masturbation jokes, people being tasered, people falling over, homophobic jokes, fat jokes, bad acne jokes.. and on, and on, and on.
There’s only one scenario in which I could recommend Just Friends. If you ever feel upset, depressed, or downright worthless, like your life doesn’t amount to anything, watch this movie. At any other point in your life, it would destroy you to see these actors wasting their time on-screen. At your lowest, it will be like a homeless beggar spotting a tormented soul, stuck in hell for eternity. You’ll realize that your problems can be overcome. There’s still hope in the world! Otherwise, Just Friends just sucks. (On DVD, June 10, 2015)
