Stars serve up Christmas turkey
Cardboard characters deliver a script stuffed full of lumps-of-coal wisecracks
You know those office Christmas parties where everyone tries to look like they’re having a good time, but they’re really not? Well, it’s playing at a theatre near you.
A comedy-by-committee (it has two directors and multiple credited writers), Office Christmas Party takes an embarrassment-of-riches cast and gives them a script stuffed full of lumps-of-coal wisecracks.
The small army of joke-writers obviously had an eye on transgressive comedies from Animal House to The Hangover to Bad Santa. But filtered through the Hollywood feel-good comedy sieve, there’s not much left of the premise beyond contrivance and punchlines.
Josh (Jason Bateman), is a tech exec whose divorce comes through just before Christmas. His putative boss, a man-child named Clay (T.J. Miller), is being bullied by his rhymeswith-witch CEO sister Carol (Jennifer Aniston), who is using a disappointing quarter as justification for mass layoffs and — oh yeah, for cancelling the office “holiday” party and the bonuses that come with it.
She gives them an out — if they can steal a major high-tech client named Walter Davis (Courtney B. Vance), away from Dell in two days, all will be merry and bright. So Josh, Clay and the hot, tech genius Tracey (Olivia Munn), decide to kill two birds with one stone by staging the party anyway and getting Walter to come.
Them’s the bones on which hang a bunch of cardboard office-stereotypes — from which, some pretty impressive comedy talent is asked to squeeze laughs. Like SNL’s Kate McKinnon, who plays an anal HR exec with a tendency toward flatulence in stressful situations.
Rob Corddry is the loud office d-bag. Vanessa Bayer is the self-doubting, lonely single-mom who basically runs the office without credit. Karan Soni (Deadpool’s cabbie), is the office geek who’s always talking about his pretend girlfriend, and who hires a call-girl to prove she’s real. Connect those dots to a meltdown with a mood-swinging female pimp (Jillian Bell), and Aniston using the Israeli martial art Krav Maga on a bunch of Russian mobsters and you’ve got one hot mess of a comedy with minimal laughter.
The one character who seems remotely genuine is Miller’s Kyle, who is basically his Silicon Valley persona rendered more childlike.
Most of the laughs in the movie come from a few moments of slapstick. Someone knocks over a giant Christmas tree. A coked-out partier tries to play Tarzan with the ceiling Christmas lights.
The party itself is eventually a sexdrugs-and-booze-filled riot. But it’s staged anarchy without context.