Review – Snatched

I went into Snatched with mixed expectations.  Part of me thought the movie looked unfunny and lame.  Another part of me looked at the credentials of the film, Amy Schumer, Goldie Hawn, Wanda Sykes, and director Jonathon Levine, and thought that the movie had too much talent to be bad.

Much to my pleasure, it is the latter.  Snatched is a blast that perfectly balances raunchy humor with sweet mother-daughter family bonding.

Schumer plays Emily, a social media obsessed, selfish woman who gets dumped by her boyfriend before they head on an exotic vacation together.  With an extra ticket, Emily invites her ultra-cautious mother (Goldie Hawn) to join her.  While on vacation, Emily and her mother get kidnapped by a gang of thieves and must fight their way back to safety with the help of Emily’s awkward brother (Ike Barinholtz) and two women Emily and her mother met at their resort (Wanda Sykes and Joan Cusack).

Some people find Schumer annoying and I don’t know why.  Personally, I think she is incredibly funny.  After great success in Trainwreck (2015), Schumer continues to be a stellar comedic actress.  What I like most about Schumer is how her roles aren’t very glitzy and she doesn’t make herself seem spectacular.  Her characters are terrible people.  They are self-centered, immature, naive people who act like they have their shit together, but are really human messes.  This was the case with Amy in Trainwreck and it is the same with Emily in Snatched and Schumer shines.  She isn’t as affective here as she was in Trainwreck, but she is still really good, with great comedic timing and fleshing out a surprisingly deeper character that most would expect.

The rest of the cast is also very really funny.  Goldie Hawn is having a blast as Emily’s mother.  You can tell she is far and away the most talented actor in this entire picture.  She’s really a gem.  Wanda Sykes is always great and Joan Cusack is a scene stealer as the tongueless, former Special Ops solider who offers up a ton of laughs with her mannerisms and facial expressions.   Barinholtz shows off his great comedic talent once again and I loved, absolutely loved his back and forth with Department of Justice Agent Jacob (Nicholas J. Lockwood).  Mark Lockwood down as one of my favorite performances of the summer.

Along with the laughs, and there are plenty, Snatched is a fun, mother-daughter adventure tale.  It’s fun to to see privileged white people get caught in a situation where they have no idea what to do.  Emily and her mother are completely clueless on most things in the world, so the entire film, you wonder how they are going to get away from these kidnappers.  There are also a number of sweet moments between Schumer and Hawn, as Emily and her mother try to hash out issues they have with each other and within themselves.  This, doubled with some surprisingly exciting action, allowed me to forgive the more predictable sequences and the occasional flat joke.

I will be shocked if I have a more surprising movie-going experience this summer than Snatched.  What could have been a disaster turns out to be a sweet, funny, entertaining mother-daughter adventure that highlights the talented cast.  Director Jonathon Levine once again pulls out a winner and continues to make a name for himself as one of the best comedic directors we have today.

MY RATING – 3/4

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