'Good Boys' Review

Good Boys is a 2019 comedy film directed by Gene Stupnitsky, in his directorial debut, who co-wrote the script with Lee Eisenberg. The film stars Jacob Tremblay, Brady Noon, and Keith L. Williams with a assembled cast featuring Brady Noon, Molly Gordon, Lil Rel Howery, Will Forte, and Midori Francis. Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg serve as producers through their Point Grey Pictures banner.

Invited to his first kissing party, 12-year-old Max asks his best friends Lucas and Thor for some much-needed help on how to pucker up. When they hit a dead end, Max decides to use his father's drone to spy on the teenage girls next door. When the boys lose the drone, they skip school and hatch a plan to retrieve it before Max's dad can figure out what happened.

Good Boys was a film I was really looking forward to. I really love these coming of age teen party type comedies (don't know the exact name). Superbad is one of my all time favorite films and I've seen it over a hundred times, so when this film was basically Superbad five years earlier I was extremely excited.

Although I did find the film to be a little disappointing it did what it was supposed to which was entertain. I thought this was a very funny film, and a large chunk of the jokes landed for me. There was this natural energy that surrounded the film that I really enjoyed.

In terms of entertainment and comedy the film nailed it, but it was one of the few if not the only thing the film did great. The film was littered with way too many plot device and conveniences. It made the writing come off as a little lazy. The concept in itself was actually good, but the story would've never happened if the character would've stopped and used their heads for a split second.

I thought most of everything else was fine. The characters weren't great and not the deepest, but they work. They tried to add a little heart which is something I always like from films like this, but it didn't work as good as it could've.

All in all this was an entertaining film, but I felt that it had potential to be so much more. I really liked the ending, but with the exception of that it didn't feel like much of an emphasis was placed on the quality of the film. Instead they took the safe route and went for quick and easy laughs. With that being said it's hard to criticize a comedy film for focusing on comedy. It's like criticizing a animated Disney film for not being mature enough. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense, so that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying the film took a lot of shortcut in terms of the story and put a lot of things in the back of their heads that wasn't funny, and if the ending was anything to go on this film could of been great if only they would've showed the same amount of attention to everything else.

In the end this was a very funny and watchable if not forgettable film. It's clear the film had one mission to entertain which it does, but everything just felt good at best. This was a very entertaining film that I enjoyed, but one that still left me slightly disappointed.

The acting was definitely one of the better parts of the film. Jacob Tremblay was great of course. He was definitely the actor I was the most familiar with. His character didn't have a ton of depth, but he made the character likable enough. Keith L. Williams and Brady Noon also did very good in their roles, and I thought the three shared great chemistry.

The rest of the cast also did very well. The acting was solid all around.

I thought the plot really could've used some work. The concept itself was great, but that's all they really had.

These characters cause just about every single last one of their problems. They simply don't use their heads. They want to learn how to kiss, but instead of Googling it they do something stupid that cause more problems. This happened so many times that it got a little annoying. To make it worse the characters rarely got called out for it.

I thought the ending was handled well, but leading up to it wasn't great. From a writing stand point it just seemed like a weird choice. The entire story just felt a little forced, and a lot of the film felt unnecessary.

I wish they would've added just a little more depth to the plot.

Overall I thought it was a very entertaining film despite it's flaws. It was a very watchable film, but not one I'd rush to see again.

The jokes and comedy work, but nothing else the film did was exceptionally great. The entire thing felt like a huge missed opportunity. The concept itself had great potential, but it felt like they played it safe.

It's not a bad film by any means. It's very funny and entertaining, but that wasn't enough to make up for it's flaws. In the end it was an enjoyably flawed comedy that I had fun with even though I was a little disappointed.