Imaginary Friends Come to Life in Two-Hour Long Snooze Fest

I won’t sit here and pretend that I wasn’t roped into watching this movie due to a particular movie star known for wearing a red costume and spouting foul-mouthed insults. I will also not pretend that I didn’t have high hopes for this film. With the star-studded cast, who wouldn’t?

What I watched was perhaps one of the worst comedy movies ever made, and this hits even more disappointingly knowing the sheer amount of comedic talent that this movie has. And yes, while Reynolds gives a charming performance as the worn-out matchmaker for imaginary friends, sadly the Deadpool star simply cannot carry this movie by himself.

While IF might be a perfectly entertaining film for viewers under the age of five, I will have regrettably lost that same number in pounds sterling, as this amazing cast delivers a wonderful performance to a plot that feels so lazy it might as well have been written and directed by a sloth.

Krasinski, known for his starring role on the US version of The Office and his writing and directing of the Quiet Place film series, brings us into the tale of Bea (The Walking Dead’s Cailey Fleming), a girl dealing with the loss of her mother some years past, and her father (played charmingly by director/writer Krasinski). Bea is back in New York for the first time in many years.

Living with her grandmother (Fiona Shaw), Bea stumbles into the world of Imaginary Friends (IFs as they are stupidly called). Helping her upstairs neighbor Cal (Ryan Reynolds), Bea decides to help find new homes for IFs whose kids have grown up or forgotten them. These include Blue (Steve Carell), a gargantuan purple monster who’s a bit lacking in common sense, and Blossom (Phoebe Waller-Bridge), a British butterfly-horse hybrid who’s Cal’s roommate, among many others.

Bea works with her new gang of friends to re-house the abandoned cast of imaginary creatures while she deals with the grief of living without her mother and potentially losing her father. All while exploring this exciting new world, one wonders – what if…you could get a refund.

Do NOT see this film unless you are a child. This is by no means a good film – its poor attempts at humor often fall short and the twist in the last act of the movie is so ridiculously obvious I’m sure most people would have guessed it before they even stepped into the theater.

It is a shame that the film falls so short and it’s entirely down to the lack of a thought-out plot. Cailey Fleming does some fantastic work as a young actor; her performance demonstrates she’s more than capable of standing side by side with titans of the industry. It is the presence of those titans who sadly do not do the film justice.

So what if Ryan Reynolds is the lead actor? Is he needed? Honestly, I think not! Mostly, his presence is a cheap form of advertising to a generation who’ve fallen in love with his performance as Wade ‘Deadpool’ Wilson. It seems like a lot of actors are present in this film just because Krasinski is good friends with them, including his own wife Emily Blunt, who plays a unicorn IF. Seriously, if you get a moment, look at IMDb. Bradley Cooper, Matt Damon, Blake Lively. Brad Pitt is allegedly even in this, and he doesn’t even have a single line! And I say alleged because his role is an INVISIBLE IF!

Now, huge cast aside, the models the actors play at least look amazing. My props to the VFX team and a question – why so much effort for such a bad flick? Again, aside visually, IF is quite a fantastical world to look at. Each character feels unique and demonstrates the individuality of the human spirit. Quite frankly, a greater exploration of these moments, looking at what stays in our core self from childhood into our senior years, might have upped the ratings from a U to a 12. And yet these moments are where I see the potential for the story.

There is one short sequence in the latter half of the film involving Blossom dancing ballet that is so uniquely powerful it might have singlehandedly stopped me from cutting my losses and making an early dash to catch the next bus home.

It is a shame that Krasinski falls so flat with what could have been a truly remarkable movie that feels as though it’s attempting to carry itself on the shoulders of its director and lead actors’ comedic abilities. Yet without (as much) comedy, perhaps this may have been a story that makes us wonder “what if?” and explore all the paths that grow from that root question.

Entirely derivative and relying too heavily on humor, this poor attempt to tell a story about imaginary friends (I refuse to call them IFs, it’s beyond ridiculous!) will likely be one soon forgotten. While it’s perfectly good entertainment and a pleasant visual spectacle for the younger audience, anyone with a lick of good taste and common sense will save their cash for Inside Out 2 in June.

4.5 out of 10.