Trainwreck Review

Trainwreck is the new film from up and coming star Amy Schumer, who has become incredibly popular in the past year or so. It stars Schumer, Bill Hader, and a host of celebrities, including the surprisingly funny Lebron James and John Cena. It is also directed by Judd Apatow, making his first movie since 2012's This Is 40. In the film, the main character Amy, played by Schumer, is a pot smoking, heavy drinking magazine writer who was raised to believe that monogamy isn't realistic. This lifestyle is put to the test when she meets Aaron Conners, played by Hader, whom she falls for. This relationship challenges all that she has ever known, and it remains to be seen whether she can make it work. The film is totally the Amy Schumer show, as she wrote the film and her style is felt throughout the entire runtime. Sadly, I didn't find myself laughing as much as I wanted to. I haven't really seen much of her stuff outside of the film, but the material I had viewed didn't really do it for me. The movie didn't make me eager to seek out any more of her material either, which could be seen as a bad thing. Even though she isn't really my cup of tea, that didn't ruin the movie. Luckily, the supporting cast Schumer surrounded herself with are very funny people. Lebron, John Cena, and Bill Hader were all hilarious, and really injected the film with great timing and perfect delivery of their lines. However, since this is a Judd Apatow feature, the comedy co-exists with an emotional angle that is just as important. The problem with this, however, is that the movie feels very overstuffed and unfocused. The story was all over the place, with the focus being the story Amy is writing on Aaron one moment, and then abruptly shifting to Aaron's ability to perform at his job. If the script had been trimmed down and the focus redirected, I believe the film would be a lot stronger. Besides Schumer not really doing it for me, my biggest complaint is that the film is far too long. Clocking in at over two hours long, there were definitely useless scenes of banter between characters that could have been cut out. Overall, this movie wasn't horrible, but it wasn't as good as some of Apatow's other work and it didn't turn me onto to Schumer's style of comedy. It's worth the matinee price of a ticket. If you are a big fan of Schumer, I recommend that you see the movie, as she is the star of the show. If not, I would suggest seeing something else, like the surprisingly fantastic Magic Mike XXL.

Trainwreck gets a 6/10.