Directed by: Pamela Adlon
Distributed by: Neon
Written by Michael Clawson
60/100
Splitting the difference between “Knocked Up” and an episode of “Broad City,” the gross-out comedy “Babes” has sporadic success in mining pregnancy, parenthood, and female friendship for laughs. It follows Eden and Dawn (comedians Ilana Glazer and Michelle Buteau), childhood best friends who grew up together in NYC. As adults, they’re as in sync with each other as ever (Glazer and Buteau have decent chemistry), but they’re now at different stations in life: Dawn is married, has two children, and is gainfully employed, while Eden is single, childless, and blissfully naïve about the messy, hard truths of becoming a mother. That is until a one-night stand leaves Eden pregnant, and she decides to keep the baby. How hard could childbearing really be, she wonders, with the same free-spirited, go-for-broke enthusiasm of Ilana Wexler. Turns out, it’s far wetter, sweatier, and more uncomfortable than she imagined, and Dawn is increasingly too preoccupied with her own responsibilities and maternal stress to provide the support that Eden had banked on.
The ”Broad City” comparison is unavoidable, and does “Babes” no favors. Where the characters of that great show were so sharply and colorfully defined, the situations so hilariously specific and ridiculous, “Babes” is all-around less distinctive. Indeed, the funniest moments are ones that would be right at home in “Broad City,” like Eden wearing a prom dress when she goes into labor. The movie more often looks for humor in all of the bodily particulars of pregnancy and parenting – think diaper jokes and poop jokes – aiming for relatability but infrequently achieving laugh-out-loud results. The script strives for buoyancy as well, brushing past heavier story beats through what feel like shortcuts. For instance, we learn that it’s due to agoraphobia that Eden’s father can’t be present throughout her pregnancy, which plays as little more than a convenient reason for why Eden values Dawn’s friendship so intensely. Not an unpleasant movie by any means, but in terms of both its raunchy sensibility and its frankness about how the demands of adult life can threaten to suffocate a friendship, “Babes” is less than wholly satisfying.
“Babes” Trailer
Michael Clawson is a member of the Seattle Film Critic Society you can follow his passion for film on Letterboxd.