Review: 'You're Cordially Invited' to a perfectly average streaming option
Nothing about the new Will Ferrell-Reese Witherspoon movie will harm your day, but you'll long for better material.
An hour into the movie, You’re Cordially Invited appeared to be a decent movie. The feet were moving and the smiles were frequent. Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon playing competing wedding parties who collide on a weekend in June after being double-booked at a venue was working its easygoing magic. A few laugh-out-loud moments and decent musical number from Ferrell had pumped enough fuel into a premise that was starting to wear thin.
Written and directed by Nicholas Stoller, who has produced gems like Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Neighbors, it wasn’t a stretch of the imagination to hope for something worthwhile. Two movie stars and a comedy-directing veteran seemed to be a decent match for an Amazon Prime event. The only problem was that it was a straight-to-streaming release. Warning sign #1: When a Ferrell-Witherspoon movie can’t open in theaters, it must be closer to a bomb than a good flick.
A January theatrical release is frowned upon in film critic land due to the low grade material that finds its way into theaters during the opening bell of the year. A January streaming release is like shoving your kid out into the alley and leaving them there for two hours. All the warning signs were there, but a chance to see a 90s-star-driven release prompted me to attend the screening.
I don’t need to go deep into the plot details for you to build a bridge that leads towards this movie or away from it, so know this. If you take a look at the trailer and get a whiff of “diet, sorta funny that could dissolve into not funny quickly,” you were right. Ferrell is a widow whose daughter is getting married, even if the guy didn’t ask for his hand in marriage and he hated the idea a few minutes before finding out. Witherspoon is the workaholic with a reality TV show who doesn’t know her nieces and nephews’ names. They butt heads in the most lame ways possible, which doesn’t help the formulaic third act.
Instead of going for legit laughs and leaning into the raunchy side of comedy they tested in the first half of the movie, Stoller’s film lays up for hollow heartfelt vibes. Everybody doesn’t need to hear Ferrell remind the world that he can carry a tune, and Witherspoon deserves better material than some retrograde rom-com compost. If you thought the film wouldn’t force a romance between the two leads down our throats by the end of the still-felt-too-long 110-minute runtime, you’re unfortunately wrong.
This movie was way better when it was called The Wedding Planner and it starred Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Lopez. You’re Cordially Invited is a perfectly average (aka forgettable) comedy that stops generating laughs at the 45-60 minute mark, making one wish they had ripped up the invitation.
If anything keeps it watchable, it’s the effort of their stars. Stoller’s script may give them pennies to create dimes with, but Ferrell and Witherspoon do what they can. The supporting cast, including Leanne Morgan as an outspoken and horny relative, do their best to inflate the jokes.
You’re Cordially Invited is the movie you turn on late at night, paying half-attention to it while a grocery list or Amazon list is prepared. Since you’re on Prime already, you may as well knock out two birds with one stone.
The best thing I got out of this was taking the smoking hot wife on a date. A night out during the week makes any movie event worthy. Both of us just wished the movie had been better than the salty popcorn.