1167. Welcome To Me (2014)

Starring; Kristen Wiig, James Marsden, Linda Cardellini

Director: Shira Piven

Running Time: 87 mins

Welcome To Me is an American film about a woman with a history of psychiatric problems who wins the lottery, and decides to host her own talk show, all about her.

This is a film with a fascinating premise, and an initially brilliant presentation of what your average idiot would do if they won millions of dollars, complete with a intriguingly dark atmosphere. However, it does ultimately descend into a disappointingly generic story line, and just isn’t as interesting or entertaining as it could have been.

But let’s start on the positive side, where there still is quite a lot to say. Kristen Wiig stars as this woman who’s clearly not all there right from the off, but she turns what could have been a bit of a downbeat character into a brilliantly unpredictable one. She may not be hilarious in the role, but in terms of the dramatic value of her performance, it’s surprisingly fantastic, and holds the film really well for the first act and a bit.

In fact, it’s that whole first act that is just fascinating. The main character is so unpredictable and worrying that you can’t look away from every car crash of a situation she gets herself into, and that provides both a very entertaining watch, as well as an intriguingly disturbing one, because you know that this sort of madness is a very real possibility, but it’s still great to watch.

So, for the best part of forty minutes, this is a very interesting, pretty original and very entertaining film to watch, but it unfortunately goes south very quickly, and never manages to pick itself back up.

The main issue is that it loses its way with the blend of disturbing comedy and drama in the second act, and becomes a much more slapstick-based comedy, whilst the drama isn’t as powerful or unsettling as we see this woman get further and further into her ‘career’ as a talk show host, and that meant that I really began to lose interest as the film came to a close.

What was also disappointing was that the main character unfortunately changed from an unpredictable force within the story to one with a very generic and frustratingly predictable character arc. Her development once she has reached the height of her egotistical madness is nowhere near as interesting as it had been up to that point, and that was a real shame to see.

Overall, I’ll give Welcome To Me a 6.8, because despite its strong issues that proved hugely disappointing in the latter half, it has a fascinating and hugely enticing first act that is definitely worth a watch.