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In the raunchy movie, You're Cordially Invited, Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon face a mortifying conundrum. Their family's destination weddings have been double booked for the same weekend. The movie feels like a familiar throwback to the 2000s, and it's directed by Nicholas Stoller, who made Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Neighbors. I'm Linda Holmes. And I'm Aisha Harris. And today we're talking about You're Cordially Invited on Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR.
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Joining us today is the co-host of Slate's ICYMI podcast and former PCHH producer Candice Lim. It's so lovely to have you back, Candice. Hello. Oh my gosh. Hello. Yay. So nice to have this little mini reunion, especially for this kind of low stakes, but high stakes, according to the characters' movies. Yeah.
So, You're Cordially Invited stars Will Ferrell as Jim, a widower whose daughter Jenny announces her engagement. She's played by Geraldine Viswanathan. And Reese Witherspoon is Margot, whose sister Nev is also getting married. She's played by Meredith Hagner.
Now, through a series of misfortunate events, both families wind up being double booked for the same location on the same weekend. Whose credit card do you have on file? Let me finish explaining. Yours. So the place is legally... Yours. So whose credit card's on file? You know damn well whose credit card he has on file. Stop saying credit card. Credit card, credit card, credit card. The horror, the horror. They reluctantly agree to share the venue, but unsurprisingly, nothing goes smoothly as planned.
You're cordially invited to streaming now on Prime Video. And of course, we have to mention that Amazon supports NPR and pays to distribute some of our content. So Linda, let's start with you. How did this movie feel for you? Yeah.
Yeah, I am sort of the obvious consumer for this movie because a lot of these people are people I have liked a lot in other things. I like a wedding comedy. I even liked the one where Jennifer Lopez wound up having to fight a bunch of violent criminals. I mean, I felt a little bit underwhelmed by this film. I just didn't think it quite came together. I mean, something like this always needs a certain amount of
convoluted business going on in order to create whatever the central conflict is. In this case, I think it winds up feeling pretty obvious that they can accommodate both of these weddings at this inn. And it's not completely clear why everybody was trying to be like the only one in the house. Ceremony? Oh, we need the dock. Well, okay. We're willing to split the dock. It's too tiny and narrow. I don't think we can split it. He's correct about that.
Maybe we could split it by time. Yes, we'll take the first half of sunset. And we'll take the second half. Is timing the sunset even a thing?
And the fact that nobody had been in contact with the venue at any time about anything for one of the two weddings, I don't think they did a good enough job making the convoluted, unbelievable stuff believable enough to kind of make it just flow through the movie. I like the idea of a kind of rom-com element with Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon. They're both funny. She is obviously a rom-com goddess of some renown.
I don't think this works as a romantic comedy at all. With that said, there are elements of it that I think are fun. I think the supporting cast is fun. I very much like Geraldine Viswanathan, who was also in Blockers, which is a movie that we really liked. I typically really like Stoller's stuff as well.
This was not my speed. But at the same time, I kind of had a fine time sitting around watching it on like a Friday night. It was fine. Yeah, yeah. The one question I had when they were like, okay, we're going to share their venue was, okay, are they doubling the staff? Like, how is this going to work? Or are the staff going to just have to work extra hard to accommodate twice as many people?
questions, labor questions that are not asked in this script and definitely not answered. But Candice, I'm curious what your thoughts are on this. I mean, I lean with you, Linda, where it's like,
I walk into this thinking, I should have liked this. I really like Nicholas Stoller's work. I love Neighbors. I really liked Friends from College. And I really liked Bros. And so to me, I'm kind of like, this guy is here for a good reason. I wonder if they cast Will Ferrell to kind of bring the calm and Reese Witherspoon to bring the
rom which is like a good idea in theory right because the movie I'm thinking of immediately is like The Proposal where it's like Sandra Bullock Ryan Reynolds you don't exactly expect them to work and that movie is perfect and so I think they were trying to capture magic in a bottle here but I'm with you where it's like
I didn't love this movie. And if I'm going to like place it in the wedding film canon for me, I am going to say I do think it is better than Shotgun Wedding, which is the 2022 movie with JLo and Justin Mel. It is not better than Marry Me, okay, which has been stubbed multiple times in the best original song category. But I
I think like in this pyramid for me, the very top, the apex of it is Bridesmaids and The Proposal. I think those are two movies that like use the premise of wedding, but they're not really about weddings. And I love that. And I think...
this movie had like a cast that on paper should work but i think my first thought is press notes for this film they keep saying this is reese's first wedding comedy i would argue it's not she's been in a great one called sweet home alabama i was gonna say sweet home alabama is enough of a wedding comedy it's certainly a kind of like married or marrying people comedy yeah and the
Themes are very similar, right? Where it's like Southern girl in the city comes home, has to interact with her Southerness and kind of have this question of like, am I really of my family? Am I someone else? And then Will Ferrell, I'm also going to argue, has been in a wedding adjacent movie called Step Brothers. And that is my favorite film of all time. And so I'm mentioning all these movies because I think what they have that this one doesn't is like,
And cleverness and hijinks and a conflict that feels high stakes enough, or even if it's stupid, even if you're bringing alligators into people's rooms, it's so funny that you're like, I'm bought in, I'm bought in, I'm bought in. I think what's missing is like, we don't have that like Kristen Wiig, Rose Byrne singing, that's what friends are for moment. We don't have some of these kind of like land onto the be like, well, those are stars. In fact, I'm going to argue, I think the supporting cast is.
carried this movie. But that's where I stand. Okay, interesting. I hear you and I agree with pretty much everything you say. And yet I think I had way more fun at this than either you did. Yeah, you love this movie. Okay, I don't love it. Like, is this going to be a I watch it every year or every few years? No. But would I return to this? I think so. I think
the issue that comes up with them trying to sort of pigeonhole this rom, making this like a rom comedy between Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon is the fact that there's just like so much other stuff happening there. This movie, it hits the hour long mark. And then I was like, wait, it's too long. First off, it's too long. And it like, there's all these twists and turns and reveals and fake outs that happen where,
Where I was just like, oh, this could have been a tight 90 and it would have been... I know. We say this all the time, but I do think to some extent the way we're supposed to believe at the end that Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon had any sort of interest in each other beyond trying to get their respective weddings off the ground. Didn't come through. No. Did not come through at all. And so they kind of retcon it in a weird way that is supposed to be funny, but does not land. Yeah. That being said...
That being said, I agree with you, Candice, that the supporting cast definitely to a large extent carries this. I want to shout out someone who has come up several times on this show. I feel like I'm actually usually the one who brings it up. But Kayla Montaroso-Mijia, who is playing Heather, she's the one who kind of screws this up for everyone. And there's a moment where they realize that she screwed it up and her and Will Ferrell are yelling at each other about her not confirming it.
It's so great. - Best scene. - You said you handled it. Why didn't you just give him your credit card? - Well, you said it was reserved. I didn't know I had to double check. - So you never even called this place? - I have social anxiety, so I just send emails. - You get anxiety from dialing a phone?
I love those little moments. I also enjoyed seeing Jack McBrayer from 30 Rock playing Leslie. His mother was the former owner of the inn, and now he's taken over. He's fun. It's just great to see those relationships. And if it had just been like a little bit shorter, I think it would have really kind of like crackled because there are moments, there are scenes, there is chemistry. I also just appreciated seeing...
A relationship between Margot and Nev, the sisters Reese Witherspoon and Meredith Hagner. And the fact that they are the siblings who are like attached to the hip and then they don't really like the rest of the family, which is something like it's a dynamic we don't often see in movies to see them kind of like dealing with that and their mothers. Flora, who's played by Celia Weston.
I enjoyed those moments. It was fun for me. One of the reasons I think this is not that satisfying is that these two stories of these two weddings don't really have anything to do with each other. All these people are not connected to each other. So you have essentially a wedding plot over here that involves a whole family and a whole set of conflicts that they're trying to serve. Another one on the other side that involves a whole family and a whole set of conflicts they're trying to serve. Plus, they're trying to build up
this potential romantic connection between Reese Witherspoon and Will Ferrell. It's interesting because we've mentioned several Nicholas Stoller projects that people liked. I would call out another one. He was one of the creators of Platonic on Apple TV, which I love. I think there are too many stories. All these people know what they're doing. All these people are good at doing this kind of thing that they're doing.
But I just think the story didn't quite land for me. Another person that I would shout out that we have not talked about yet is Jimmy Tatro, who is kind of our leading cultural lunkhead. He was in American Vandal. And then he was in Theater Camp. And he is so good. And here he is alive.
a little bit different, right? He's still a lunkhead, but there's a kinder twist on it. But he still is just, to me, super charming and funny. I'm always happy to see him. There are tons of things to like about this movie. I just didn't think it coalesced. And Aisha kind of alluded to it. They try to kind of retcon this romance by ultimately kind of, you know, it's a montage where
It's like, look back on all these moments where we were in the process of being into each other, but none of those moments were presented that way at the time. And it's done for comedic purposes, but it's all also makes the romantic element of it not make sense. Just didn't quite come together. But it's not unpleasurable either.
for its individual elements. Yeah. I think it's really funny that you're not mentioning that Jimmy Tatro plays a medic turned stripper. Yes. That is very important to me. And I really think he had the one scene of the film that made me laugh out loud where he, like, is about to strip at the wedding and then Will Ferrell runs in and, like, interrupts it and Jimmy's just like, oh, and I'm just like, been there. But...
Linda, I agree. I think my big issue with this film, I'm seeing a lot of telling, not showing. And the scene that irked me is when Reese Witherspoon is kind of like getting her anger out, very like Ryan Reynolds proposal style. She's like hitting golf balls into the water. Will Ferrell comes up to her to console her. And within like two minutes, they kind of just like say exactly what the real underlying motivations and issues are. My thing is that I don't think
these two characters had earned it by that point. We are only halfway through the film. I needed more hijinks. I needed more saboteurs. I needed more, like, hidden manifestations of motivation to get us to that place. And what's really funny is I walk out of that scene being like, well, those people are never going to kiss...
I was wrong. LOL. Right. But that's the thing. I mean, you're even referring to the montage at the end where it's Will Ferrell's face, I guess, smiling multiple times. To me, that is also telling, not true. It is. Because if you were really showing it, you would have planted it slowly throughout the movie. I'm also going to make the argument that...
I think Will likes Reese. I do not think Reese liked Will's character, even towards the end. I was like, I think this is a one-sided relationship. Again, I hear you. It's all, it was not very well executed. And yet, I think what I, I just found it very comforting to see that this kind of movie is still getting made, even if it is of the lesser quality. And it's like not going to hold a candle to something like Bridesmaids or Neighbors. I also just thought it was kind of fun to see these two characters
who they feel like a different generation to me, although he's only like nine or 10 years older than her, which is strange. But I guess like I found this to be an interesting way of like looking at both sort of generational, like microgenerational differences between people and how they approach relationships and love and
It's low-hanging fruit, but again, I enjoyed the sort of Southern person who comes back and has to deal with, like, there's a funny scene where her family, Reese Witherspoon's family, is all asking her questions, like, about California. It hit a little close to home. Have you been affected by the floods? No. No? No. Have you been affected by taxes? What? Have you been affected by the homeless? I don't know, Mom. How's Atlanta? Are you affected by the racism? No.
It was very much a comfort watch for me more than anything else. Something I love about comedies, and I'm really thinking about the stepbrother genre, is the fact that all of those movies are always great first times and exposures to people you end up loving. I'm thinking about...
Catherine Han in Step Brothers. That was a role that was probably a few lines and she was so dynamic. She kind of pretty much became one of my favorite supporting characters from then. Yeah. And I think for this film, it's going to be a great kind of like portfolio for people who don't know Geraldine as much or people who don't know Kayla as much. And I think I'm going to give it up to Leanne Morgan, who plays Gwyneth, who is Reese's sister in the movie. She's
so funny and sharp and she's a comedian and I was like oh like that's a person I google after all of this is done and so I think if anything maybe come into this film not for the leads but for the supporting because I bet you love someone yeah you know yes and I will say like when you're talking about the supporting cast one of the things comedically that did sort of work for me was this these interactions between Will Ferrell and all of his daughter's friends and
Oh, yeah. He has a couple of, like, confrontations, not just with Heather, but with kind of this whole group of friends. Yeah, yeah. I did think those things were quite entertaining and I enjoyed. I was also kind of shocked that, like, the Will Ferrell wedding party seemed to be mostly children and, like, young adults and, like, barely any adults. I know. I was like, where is this just, like? Also, she had sex.
He had so many bridesmaids and basically that's your wedding attendee guest list. Interesting. Interesting. There was a lot going on here. And I will say just to add, I do think what I admire about this is even if it doesn't all work, it doesn't feel like a wholly cynical exercise. It feels like everyone was just having fun and they were doing their best. Yeah.
I will always be in the tank for any movie that, like, even if it doesn't work, feels at least that it was, like, made from something real, something that doesn't feel just, like, very cash-grabby. Right. Amen to that. I have always said you can tell when a movie is made and nobody cared about it. And I do not necessarily get that feel from this film at all. Yeah. Look, they can't all be Barb and Star. Oh, my God. They just can't. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
Well, we want to know what you think about You're Cordially Invited. I'm sure a lot of you have watched it. Find us at facebook.com slash pchh and on Letterboxd at letterboxd.com slash nprpopculture. We'll include a link in our episode description.
That brings us to the end of our show. Candice Lim, Linda Holmes, thanks so much for being here. This was so much fun. Thank you. Thank you, Aisha. This episode was produced by Hafsa Fathima and Lennon Sherburn and edited by Mike Katziff. Our supervising producer is Jessica Reedy and Hello Come In provides our theme music. Thanks so much for listening to Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR. I'm Aisha Harris. We'll see you all next time.
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