Drinking Buddies

Olivia Wilde Director: Joe Swanberg Joe Swanberg

Overview

Indie filmmaker Joe Swanberg wrote and directed this romantic comedy drama centering on the sexual tension between craft-brewery employees Luke (Jake Johnson) and Kate (Olivia Wilde), who wrestle with their growing attraction to one another due to the fact that they're already both in committed relationships. With Luke's marriage-minded girlfriend Jill (Anna Kendrick) and Kate's boyfriend Chris (Ron Livingston) out of the picture for a weekend, the flirtatious co-workers learn there is no denying what the heart really wants.

Product Details

Release Date:	02/01/2020
UPC:	0876964006156
Original Release:	2013
Source:	Magnolia Home Ent
Region Code:	1
Time:	1:30:00
Sales rank:	51,692

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Olivia Wilde	Kate
Jake Johnson	Luke
Anna Kendrick	Jill
Ron Livingston	Chris
Ti West	Dave
Jason Sudeikis	Gene Dentler (billed as 'Himself')
Mike Brune	Mike
Frank V. Ross	Frank
Michael Gaertner	Man w/Fiance
Kristin Davis	Fiance
Jim Cibak	Jim
Alicia van Couvering	Amy
Joe Swanberg	Angry Car Guy
Michael Zeller	Eli

Technical Credits

Joe Swanberg

Joe Swanberg	Director,Editor,Producer,Screenwriter
Mark Bennett	Casting
Paul Bernon	Producer
Ashley Bernon	Executive Producer
Nick Biscardi	Sound Editor
Amanda Ford	Costumes/Costume Designer
David Kaplan	Executive Producer
Jessica Klapman	Executive Producer
Jesse McAlpin	Sound Mixer
Akin McKenzie	Art Director
Chris Modoono	Co-producer
Margaret J. Orlando	Production Manager
Ben Richardson	Cinematographer
Andrea Roa	Producer
Rajen Savjani	Executive Producer
Anish Savjani	Executive Producer
Sam Slater	Producer
Chris Swanson	Musical Direction/Supervision
Brandon Tonner-Connelly	Production Designer
Alicia van Couvering	Producer
Olivia Wilde	Executive Producer
Mike Witherill	Executive Producer
Alex Witherill	Co-producer

Editorial Reviews

Writer/director Joe Swanberg's mumblecore comedy Drinking Buddies follows several days in the lives of four people: brewery event planner Kate (Olivia Wilde); her friend and co-worker Luke (Jake Johnson); her record-producer boyfriend Chris (Ron Livingston); and Luke's girlfriend Jill (Anna Kendrick), a special-needs teacher. As the couples connect and head off to a weekend retreat together in Michigan, they flirt with the idea of exchanging partners. Later, when one of the relationships ends and the other lovers experience a brief amicable separation due to one partner's trip abroad, the future begins to seem highly uncertain. You've got to hand it to the mumblecore directors: When you walk into one of their movies, at least you know what you're going to get; unpredictability is not on the menu. As in Funny Ha Ha, The Puffy Chair, and many other pictures from this school, we're handed a group of aimless twenty- and thirtysomething people engaging in long "witty" discussions about nothing and -- on a broader narrative level -- weaving hypnotically in and out of each other's romantic lives. If this is your cup of tea, you'll find much to love in Drinking Buddies. And even if it isn't, you have to admit that Swanberg is comparatively defter at this sort of thing than his mumblecore contemporaries, such as Andrew Bujalski and the vastly overrated Safdie brothers. As a result of Swanberg's skill, Drinking Buddies sneaks up on you; at first you're put off by the vapidness of the conversations had by these IPA-quaffing ne'er-do-wells, but as the movie rolls forward you start to sink into its rhythms and care more than you expected to. The writer/director is particularly fine in one-on-one scenes (such as a penultimate exchange between Kate and Luke -- arguably the most acutely written and involving sequence in the film) in which the two friends engage in subtle mutual recriminations and inadvertently reveal some major self-delusions, both to each other and to us. Having said that, the lead actors are also quite good -- Wilde exhibits an earthy sexiness and playful wit; Kendrick does well as a quiet, affectionate girlfriend; and Jason Sudeikis has a funny unbilled role as a brewery manager. It's Livingston, however, who steals the film: Chris is so much deeper and more sophisticated than Kate and her buddies that he actually seems to exist and function on a higher plane. (Swanberg would have done everyone a favor by making the entire picture about him.) Only Jake Johnson seems miscast, playing a bearded character so grungy and unkempt that he looks like the love child of Euell Gibbons and Uncle Jesse from The Dukes of Hazzard. As a result, we have trouble accepting this guy as a romantic lead. If the film has an overarching problem, though, it's one that applies to the entire mumblecore movement: Many of these characters aren't interesting enough to sustain a whole movie, and the conflicts are so low-key and wispy that they invite viewer ambivalence. Minimalism is a very tricky thing to pull off; the Berlin School films from Germany have the same relaxed, casual approach, albeit in a deceptive way -- very real, palpable conflicts are constantly there, lurking beneath the surface of the material. But we don't often get the same magnetic pull in mumblecore, and certainly not in Buddies. Although its style cut against the mumblecore grain, American director Josh Sternfeld's criminally overlooked Winter Solstice achieved some of the same goals within a minimalist context, yet managed to keep us deeply involved throughout. In Drinking Buddies, we get flashes of that involvement, even intermittent sequences that hook us, but the feeling that we're left with is one of inconsequentiality. It's a safe bet, though, that viewers in the same age bracket and with the same lifestyle and mindset of the lead characters will be able to relate to much of what plays out onscreen.

All Movie Guide - Nathan Southern