The British dark comedy THE TROUBLE WITH JESSICA has trouble for all, in a satirical tale where a dinner party between old friends goes so very, very wrong. Director Matt Winn’s dark tale features a starry British cast, with Rufus Sewell, Shirley Henderson, Alan Tudyk and Olivia Williams, with Indira Varma as Jessica. The trouble with Jessica (Indira Varma) is that she is a lot of trouble, something which architect Tom (Alan Tudyk) and wife Sarah (Shirley Henderson) already have in abundance. And what happens when she comes to dinner is even more trouble. However, the film THE TROUBLE WITH JESSICA has plenty of troubles of its own.
Tom and Sarah appear to have a comfortable life but they are in a terrible financial bind, due to a big architectural project that fell through, and now they are forced to sell their lovely London home. The good news is that they have found a buyer just in time to rescue them from financial disaster. The married couple are planning to have one last dinner party in their home before they must leave, with just their best friends, Richard (Rufus Sewell) and Beth (Olivia Williams), whom they have known since college.
But then Tom gets a phone call from Richard, asking if they can bring along another old friend from college, Jessica. Reluctantly, Tom agrees, optimistically hoping it is alright with wife Sarah. It’s not, but now they’re stuck. The trouble with beautiful Jessica is she is braggy and self-absorbed, and with her new book, a memoir, a bestseller, she’ll be more so. Plus, as Sarah complains, she always flirts with her husband Tom, although Tom points out Jessica flirts with everyone. But Tom has cooked plenty of food for another guest, including his signature special dessert, a clafoutis.
American audiences may not be familiar with this French dessert but it is a cherry, custard and sponge cake favorite featured on British baking shows, so anyone arriving in the house in this British dark comedy will recognize the tasty treat. And the appealing dessert becomes part of the plot.
The dinner guests arrive, and Jessica does flirt with both men and she does get on Sarah’s nerves. After a seemingly minor remark, Jessica leaves the table in a huff. When the dessert is brought out, someone eventually goes out into the back garden to check on her, where they find Jessica has hanged herself.
And this is where things get really weird. You would expect that finding that a long-time friend, no matter how much she irritates you, has committed suicide would create more of a emotional reaction, shock if not grief, in the friends that find her. And it does, but more briefly and less deeply than you would expect. That moment of shock, grief, even guilt, passes very quickly, although Beth, who is the more emotional one in the group and prone to moralizing too, holds on to is much longer, further into film.
There is something both unconvincing and creepy about the characters’ reactions to the suicide, reactions that would be cold even if she were a stranger. It makes the situation unconvincing and makes the characters seem unsympathetic as well.
The friends’ reaction is this: The suicide in shocking enough but doing it in someone else’s garden? Outrageous. Who does that? So inconsiderate because it creates special problems. Quickly, Sarah thinks of one special problem: will the suicide impact the sale of the house? Will the buyers back out because someone died there? Beth immediately chides Sarah for her coldness, but the others agree that it does seem likely to cause trouble. So Sarah hatches a plan: instead of calling the police or an ambulance, they move Jessica’s body to her own apartment and make it look like the suicide happened there. Then Sarah sets about bullying everyone else into going along with it.
Gallows humor rules the day, and the dead body becomes a prop, which might have worked if the comedy were broader. What is ensues is a series of bad decisions and bad behavior, as personalities clash, and events bring out the worst in everyone, plus a few secrets too. Everyone has their flaws: hard-eyed Sarah is a manipulator, lawyer Richard is a liar, moralist Beth is a hypocrite, and architect Tom is a dreamer who thinks it will all work out fine in the end. But there is isn’t anything very surprising in the way the film mocks these too-comfortable people.
However, the cast of British powerhouse talents are fantastic, and do what they can to milk the script for darkly comic stuff, a script that turns farcical every time someone new, like the police or a nosy neighbor (Anne Reid), turns up at the door. Which happens more than you’d think.
The cast is strong even if the film’s basic concept isn’t, with Scottish actor Shirley Henderson leading the pack. American audiences may know her best from a string of Mike Leigh films, like TOPSY TURVY or the Harry Potter ones. As Tom’s accountant wife, Henderson’s Sarah knows that selling their house is the only way out of their financial pickle, after architect Tom’s big grand project, for which he borrowed after losing his backer, went bust. She brings all her iron will, and some blackmail, to bear in pressuring the others to go along with her illegal plan.
Rufus Sewell is close behind, also giving a good performance as a character who has a charming demeanor but all kinds of moral shadiness. American audiences may recognize Sewell from his roles in “The Diplomat,” “Man in the High Castle” or PBS’ “Victoria,” and he sparkles here as egotistical, slippery lawyer Richard, whose specialty is defending rapists, although he claims to hate it.
Olivia Williams’ teary-eyed Beth seems ready to clutch her metaphorical pearls as she tries to claim the moral high ground, only to cave-in to pressure. Alan Tudyk’s Tom, the architect, just seems to want to stay out of everyone’s way, while closing his eyes and hoping it will all work out in the end.
The characters’ troubles, twists and bad decisions are divided into chapters with on-screen titles that all begin “The Trouble With..,” followed by “moving a body” or so forth. That is a technical flaw in a film that is already queasy on a humanity level. There are too many of these inserted title cards, all with little darkly funny comments, and they break up the flow of the action a bit too often. While the titles do focus our attention on the characters’ foibles or dilemmas, ethical and otherwise, they also break our concentration and take us out of the film, and sometimes make the film feel a bit smug itself.
Surprisingly often, more people arrive at the door, a few of which make it inside. Every time they do, the newcomer inevitably gazes longingly at, and comments on, the tempting dessert, the fruit-studded creamy clafoutis, on the table, placed there shortly before the discovery of the body and all the trouble started. That dessert even plays a role before all it done,
While there is some biting satire, plenty gallows humor, and darkly funny moments poking fun at these people’s human foibles, and it does feature a splendid cast, but there is a certain limpness in what should have been a wild tale of a quiet dinner gone oh-so-wrong where a dessert might help save the day
THE TROUBLE WITH JESSICA opens Friday, Apr. 25, at selected theaters.
RATING: 2.5 out of 4 stars
