“I love you, toad boy”
There is no one working in the world of comedy who so wholly and impeccably captures the impotence of white male rage like Tim Robinson. His Netflix series I Think You Should Leave is a salve in our current society, allowing us to laugh at the ridiculousness of unserious people screaming at the top of their lungs that they’re right when all evidence points to the contrary.
As a fan of Robinson’s unique sense of humor, I have always been cautious with my recommendations of his show, as it is not for everyone. I approached his first lead role in a feature film with a similar amount of caginess, wondering if that sort of manic character could sustain a fully functional feature film. Thankfully it can and does, as Friendship is the film we deserve in 2025.
Robinson stars as Craig Waterman, your seemingly “average joe” who is socially awkward, but well meaning. He seems to spend most of his time away from his corporate job at home with his wife Tami (Kate Mara) and their teenage son Stevie (Jack Dylan Grazer). Running late for work one day, he runs a package over to his new neighbor Austin Carmichael (Paul Rudd) and the two strike up a, you guessed it, friendship.
Craig is naturally enamored with his charismatic new friend, and local weatherman Austin seems enchanted by the enigmatic Craig, who both dotes on and fully neglects his cancer-survivor wife. In fact, Craig is a lot stranger than Austin first realizes, and after a guys’ night party at Austin’s house takes a turn, he tries to put some distance between them. Things go south from there, especially when Craig’s wife seems to be spending a lot of time with her ex-boyfriend, and all of his money is going out the door for drum kits he doesn’t know how to play and to some company called Ocean View Dining that makes clothing for some reason.
The film calls to mind many other similar sounding films from The Cable Guy to Rudd’s own 2009 flick I Love You, Man, but this is another animal entirely. Friendship is saying something about the societal pressures on men to behave in a certain way, particularly in relation to other men. That almost uniquely male desire to be accepted at all costs, the neediness of men, how prone to emotional outbursts they are, and how they learned to deflect by projecting all of those qualities onto women. It’s also hilarious, though. There’s hardly a minute in this movie I wasn’t laughing.
One of my favorite comedies of the last twenty years, Step Brothers, is so brilliant because it takes the idea of the “man-child” literally. The Apatovian comedies of the mid-aughts brought with it a wave of criticism aimed at protagonists who were slapped with that label, but most of those dudes were functioning members of society. Like it or not, Step Brothers is brutally honest about what it looks like for 40 year olds to act like 8 year olds, and in attacking the false “macho man” bravado of the G.W. Bush era, it presaged our current hellscape in a fairly accurate manner. And in many ways it is, like Idiocracy, no longer a comedy.
Though I never buy for a second that she has (or possibly ever had) any romantic feelings for her husband, Mara’s Tami is crucial in grounding the film in some sort of real world. It would have been so easy to make her a flustered housewife with her hands on her hips, shaking her head at her husband’s latest predicament. Instead, she’s a woman coming out of her chemotherapy fog to realize she’s married to a legitimately crazy person.
Rudd is also perfectly cast, mainly because he’s spent the last two decades playing affable characters. He’s got a warm screen presence and you can’t help but think the best of his character here, even when he throws out some not too subtle indicators that he’s got some sociopath in him, likely on his father’s side. Austin clearly enjoys Craig’s company because he collects weirdos, guys designed to make Austin look even better by comparison.
In so many ways, this film is essentially the vastly superior, less pandering, fully functional version of another Paul Rudd flick, 2010’s Dinner for Schmucks. The wry smile that runs across Austin’s face upon meeting Craig for the first time is not unlike the wry smile that comes across Rudd’s character in Dinner for Schmucks (like you know what it is) when he hits Steve Carell with his car.
Writer/director Andrew DeYoung says that this is based on an experience he had getting iced by a group of friends, and I don’t doubt that for a second. However, I can imagine him seeing I Think You Should Leave, and that opening up layers of possibilities for his film. Friendship is a film where you think a character has hit rock bottom by the time he’s sobbing on his kitchen floor, but he’s only begun mining the depths of rock bottom. Basically, DeYoung and Robinson are a match made in an unbelievably awkward heaven.
The big box comedies of, essentially, Rudd’s leading man career all have a very uniform, unremarkable look. The jokes are the attraction in those movies, but Friendship also has a look and a feel that set it apart thanks to Andy Rydzewski’s cinematography and Sophie Corra’s editing. Those often overlooked, so-called “invisible” elements really stood out in my second viewing, creating a wholly satisfying cinematic experience.
The film’s look is appropriately drab, suburban, and matching Craig’s aesthetic. It warms and cools along with him as a character, and it’s a fascinating study in contrasts from DeYoung and Rydzewski. As for Corra, she and DeYoung—who apparently edited the film in her living room—know how long to sustain the awkwardness for maximum comedic impact.
If you’re looking for something different, something that’s strange but honest, over-the-top but grounded, awkward but hilarious, Friendship is the film for you. It’s not for everyone, but not every movie needs to be for everyone, and the people who will love this will find it. Even if you’re skeptical, I urge you to give it a shot. You could just as easily sit and not laugh at Paul Blart Mall Cop, so give this flick the benefit of the doubt it deserves.
Header image via IMDb