1188. Sisters (2015)

Starring: Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Ike Barinholtz

Director: Jason Moore

Running Time: 118 mins

Sisters is an American film about two grown-up sisters who, feeling frustrated with their own lives as well as their parents’ decision to sell off their childhood home, return to their hometown to throw one last party: the party of a lifetime.

Despite the pedigree of the two lead actresses in Sisters, this is in truth a painfully dull and unfunny comedy, with so few laughs and frustratingly safe humour, I found it really hard to be properly entertained by this film, worsened by the fact that it really just seems to go on and on and on and on.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love Tina Fey and Amy Poehler; they’re one of the best comedy duos in the world at the moment, but it seems that they can’t quite hit the same success on the big screen. Their previous film, Baby Mama, was an irritatingly lukewarm romantic comedy that was just as dull as this, and so it seems as if there’s something that doesn’t allow them to translate their normally genius humour into a good film.

If I can pick out a positive from this film, and it’s a bit of a stretch, it’s that Fey and Poehler do manage to still provide some reason to keep watching as this drags on into eternity. They play off of each other so well, and in the scenes when it’s just them two either arguing or just talking, it’s definitely more watchable because of the excellent chemistry that the two have.

Beyond that, however, I found nothing else to like about this film. One issue is that there’s no really interesting story to keep you engaged throughout what seems like a much longer movie than it actually is, which was a little disappointing to see, but it’s excusable given that this is a juvenile party comedy.

What I don’t understand is why the writing and humour in this film is so lukewarm. Other similar films (eg: Bad Neighbours) are fantastic at weaving the madness of an all-night party in with clever and risky humour that’s much more shocking and entertaining to laugh at, whereas this is just two hours of bland jokes all either strung out for way too long, or randomly thrown in there when the story begins to really drag.

There are laughs here, yes, but I couldn’t get anything bigger than a small, unsatisfying smirk, and that really frustrated me, because it was so clear that this film, all about letting your hair down, going back to your youth and going wild, was playing it so safe with its comedy, and missing out on some great opportunities for bigger and more memorable laughs.

Overall, Sisters is a very disappointing movie, and likely very forgettable, due to its extreme lack of a decent story, any degree of interesting or unexpected humour, and an unfortunate tendency to also repeat itself when it comes to some of the better jokes, and that’s why it gets a 5.7 from me.