Adult comedies are back. Is anyone going to do something interesting with them?

by Mitchel Green - August 31, 2023

| mitchelgreen34@gmail.com source: The Movie Database

This week sees the wide release of Emma Seligman’s new film “Bottoms,” marketed as a raunchy-as-hell queer teen sex comedy riff on “Fight Club.” It’s quite the 180 from Seligman, whose last film — the excellent “Shiva Baby” — was, while frank about sex and sexuality, specific in its targets and more restrained in its comedy. “Bottoms,” on the other hand, looks about as broad as any populist mainstream film released this year — or at least as broad as a queer teen sex comedy can be.

Maybe, when I’ve seen the film, “Bottoms” will show itself to be the subversive, cringe-inducing comedy I desperately want it to be. Judging by the prominent and proud display of “From the producers of ‘Cocaine Bear’” all over the posters and trailers, I have significant reservations. In all likelihood, “Bottoms” will be another banal, “edgy,” mainstream comedy that plays it too safe and is forgotten within hours of leaving the theater.

“Bottoms” isn’t the first attempt of the year to reenergize the raunchy R-rated comedy. The Jennifer Lawrence vehicle “No Hard Feelings” found mild success as a raunchy rom-com in a completely desaturated theatrical market. “Cocaine Bear” became a viral internet sensation last winter and rode that to nearly $90 million at the box office. And the recently released Will Farrell foul-mouthed dog comedy “Strays”... well, that one wasn’t successful. Still, it was trying to get in on the vacuum left by adult-oriented comedies moving primarily to streaming. The sudden resurgence of these types of films getting theatrical releases is promising. A more diverse release calendar is healthy for theaters and audience consumption habits. There’s just one problem. These movies aren’t good.

Filmmakers and producers seem to have taken advantage of the fact that there aren’t any movies like them in theaters anymore to rely on tried and true tropes and jokes that fall flat for anyone who has seen a mainstream studio comedy before. If there aren’t movies like this these days, audiences won’t realize how lazy their films are, right? Most of the issues here stem from problems that arise from these movies being produced or distributed by major studios.

Major studio comedies cost a lot of money to produce — “Cocaine Bear” cost around $30 million, “No Hard Feelings” and “Strays” both cost roughly $45 million. That means that to be profitable — and let’s be clear, that is the only goal of most of these types of movies — the films need to appeal to the broadest demographic possible. Being R-rated comedies, you’ve already cut off a potentially lucrative audience in teenagers and children. That means, to counteract this loss of audience, these movies often try to be very broad with their style of comedy. That means jokes are aimed at the lowest common denominator, cultural references can’t be hyper-specific lest they alienate viewers who won’t understand them, and the easy, obvious punchlines are always taken. It also means these films always follow a basic three-act structure and hit familiar character and story beats so the audience doesn’t get too confused.

As you can imagine, these comedies always feel like lazy, unimaginative, disposable corporate products — what the studios think people want to see rather than what might be a radical work of art. Sometimes, performers like Jennifer Lawrence can be endearing when they go all out for a movie that doesn’t deserve it, but that only serves as a reminder of how uninspired the rest of the film is.

Maybe “Bottoms” is different. Seligman has a far more unique voice than Elizabeth Banks or Gene Stupnitzky, and if the film is more “Shiva Baby” than “Cocaine Bear,” it could be the best comedy of the year. But it’s an MGM film, has a soundtrack by pop star Charli XCX, and is explicitly a send-up of several major studio teen comedies of the past. “Bottoms” is not an independent darling that desperately wants to make you uncomfortable, it is a crowd-pleaser. Adult comedies may be back, but if the genre continues on the path it’s on, maybe it should stay dead for a while longer.