Capsule Review 'Bert & Arnie's Guide to Friendship'

‘Bert and Arnie’s Guide to Friendship,’ the new comedy from director Jeff Kaplan, boasts a few decent performances and funny moments. But the two lead characters don’t share much chemistry or screen time, and their storylines don’t converge until the midpoint of the film. It is not the best formula for a buddy film.

Our two protagonists are pompous novelist and college professor Bert “B.W.” Sheering (Matt Oberg) and blowhard executive Arnie Hubert (Stephen Schneider). Arnie has a habit of sleeping with other men’s wives. Bert’s is one of them. Shortly after Bert learns the identity of his wife’s lover and briefly confronts him, she decides she would rather live alone. The repressed Bert shows minimal emotion as she walks out the door.

The idea of Bert and Arnie as an unlikely comic duo is rife with possibility. They are a classic mismatch: Arnie a career-driven, womanizing dunce, Bert an inhibited, uptight egotist. They have so much to teach each other.

Alas, the film keeps them apart. In a recurring conceit, Bert and Arnie discuss each other in separate “interviews” to an unseen filmmaker. This is a common sitcom trope, pioneered by the likes of ‘The Office’ and ‘Parks and Recreation’. But here the interviews must substitute for actual contact between the characters. Bert and Arnie rarely interact before the film’s midpoint.

Bert’s individual plotline is the more compelling of the two. Freshly separated from his wife, he tries to fend off advances from Faye (Cristin Milioti), a student who hopes to barter sex for a letter of recommendation. Faye, with her comically nasal voice and awkward sexual aggression, is a funny character, both sexy and unsexy at once. Oberg and Milioti have chemistry, and Milioti’s is the film’s strongest performance.

The film’s weakest performance belongs to Schneider. Arnie is an over-the-top caricature of the testosterone-driven executive. He screws anything that moves and unleashes obscenities when something upsets him. “Where the *&@! are my *&%$ing copies?!!!” Arnie shouts at one point, charging through his office like a lunatic. The performance is all brashness and obliviousness. There is no room for subtlety or nuances.

Bert and Arnie’s storylines only merge after Arnie falls for his boss, Sabrina (Anna Chlumsky of HBO’s ‘Veep’). Arnie learns she likes Bert’s novels and, in an effort to impress her, manages to get Bert to come out and meet her. Bert winds up lusting after Sabrina, while Arnie sinks into depression and anger. Bert and Arnie’s “friendship” is not the focus.

Ultimately, “Bert and Arnie’s Guide to Friendship” is forced to live and die by its problematic script and mixed performances. The result is a structurally flawed, only occasionally funny comedy.

Read the review at IndieNYC.com


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