Friends With Benefits Review

• 8th Feb 2012

A friend of a friend of a cousin of mine had a ‘friend with benefits’ once… in a dream. Yeah, a dream… Well, let me tell you right now, it had about as much to do with this charmingly modern rom-com as a bowl of spaghetti and meatballs has with the Antarctic. For a film that spends most of its time trying to avoid the normal romantic comedy stereotypes, it sure as hell ends up ticking a large number of boxes. But luckily for Sony, romantic comedy stereotypes exist for a reason ($$$$$$) – I love them, you love them, half of Hollywood is based on or around them. It’s hard to find a film which doesn’t buy into them! Even The Expendables had a sappy love story running through it in between the decapitations and water-boarding! Yes, if there’s one thing we can truly learn from Friends with Benefits, it’s that the rom-com zeitgeist is here to stay.

Once you get that thought stuck in your head, Friends with Benefits is a pretty good film. Mila Kunis is naturally beautiful, with a wit sharp enough to shake a stick at and a delightfully easy going screen presence. Opposite her, Justin Timberlake (growing from strength to strength with each role) is endearing, effeminate but no joke. Given his superstar status and genuinely unbelievable physique, he manages to embody Mr Joe “I’m-in-advertising” Bloggs with surprising ease.

We meet Dylan and Jamie (Timberlake and Kunis) on their way to a hot date, we believe, with each other.  Dylan, tied to his desk and trying to drum up some inspiration from his sappy work team (“what are we, nerds trying to look at boobies?”), has naturally forgotten all about it and, with an irate girlfriend at the other end of the phone, rushes out of the office (with a colleague’s trousers, for some reason…) with all the elegance and suaveness of Road Runner. Dylan races along the street, jumps out of his car in front of the venue and waiting for him with less-than-open arms is… Emma Stone. Who swiftly dumps him. Meanwhile, Jamie’s tardy beau finally drags himself to the cinema on the other side of America where she is waiting for him with a totally sanitary turkey sandwich. Then he dumps her! What a clever technique this is – before we know anything about these characters, before they even meet, we know that their lives are the frayed ends of two rope fibres, doomed to meet and coil around each other ever more.

It’s not long before they hook up in New York in the wake of Dylan landing a new, better job with GQ thanks to Jamie’s head hunting know-how. Their introduction is the first give away that perhaps this may just be a typical rom-com after all: Jamie’s kooky luggage conveyor belt antics smack of Bridget Jones style absurdity. Naturally the pair hit it off from the start and are exchanging fast paced, saucy banter before you can say “pass the condoms”.

Friends with Benefits’ real highlight is its script by a razor hot Keith Merryman, who, whilst acknowledging the necessity of the inevitable rom-com standards, manages to throw in some great one liners including “Shut up Katherine Heigl, you stupid liar!” and possibly the best interaction in the film:

Dylan: “I’m gonna go talk to her”
Jamie: “What , here, in front of all these people?”
Dylan: “I didn’t say I was gonna rape her, I’m gonna talk to her”

Out of tone for what we’d expect from this type of film, but well within the realms of believability for the memorable characters within it. The script is edgy without breaking the boundaries of romantic comedy, but the input of these clever little throw aways give Friends with Benefits a real verve and a tangible edge over comparatively automated films like 27 Dresses and Miss Congeniality (both of which are films I hugely enjoy, I should add).

Friends with Benefits is refreshing in so many ways but pushing it to the top of its genre is its healthy sense of modernity. It fully embraces what the 21^st Century rom-com should be in a way which I’ve not yet seen achieved with such success (although Bridesmaids is perhaps its closest (though not that close) competitor), through snippets like an iPad bible, a dysfunctional family which isn’t just the worst thing in the world, ever, and even an Alzheimer’s sufferer who doesn’t clamour for the limelight.

If you’re looking for a romantic comedy which really does steer clear of the normal clichés, try Juno or even Whip It. But if, like me, you can’t get enough of 10 Things I Hate About You and Clueless, then tune in to Friends with Benefits, which provides the warm cosiness you only get from the classic rom-com, with a healthy dose of individuality thrown in to keep you on your toes.

Dani Singer