The Aisle Seat - Movie Reviews by Mike McGranaghan
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THE AISLE SEAT - by Mike McGranaghan

"TAMMY"

Tammy
Own Tammy on Blu-ray Combo Pack, DVD, and Digital HD on November 11th

Melissa McCarthy has ended up in a rather interesting place in her career. For years, she did solid supporting work on the TV series Gilmore Girls, playing the ever-so-quirky chef Sookie. Then the movie Bridesmaids really put her on the map, transforming her from a character actress into a major comedy star and Oscar nominee. Since that time, she's proven her box office muscle, thanks to The Heat and Identity Thief. Like every big star, McCarthy is clearly interested in self-preservation and in exercising some sort of quality control. She's done this by co-writing Tammy with her husband, Ben Falcone, who also directed. While admirable, the movie (which comes to Blu-Ray on November 11 in an extended cut) is a mixed bag at best.

McCarthy plays Tammy Banks, a fast food worker who gets fired from her job, then discovers that her husband (Nat Faxon) is cheating on her with a neighbor (Toni Collette). Furious and lacking direction, she hops in a car with her alcoholic grandmother, Pearl (Susan Sarandon), and together they take a mishap-laden road trip. Along the way, the two women romance a father and son (Gary Cole and Mark Duplass), get in legal trouble, and bond in a way they never have before.

Like many road trip comedies, there isn't an abundance of plot in Tammy. It's very episodic, with the characters meandering from one comic complication to the next. Some of them are fairly amusing, such as a bit in which Tammy ineptly attempts to rob another branch of the restaurant that fired her. Others land with more of a thud.

The plus side here is that McCarthy and Falcone both seem intent on playing up her strengths. They know McCarthy is good at physical humor (especially falling down, which she does a lot in Tammy) and foul-mouthed outbursts. But they also know she can dig deeper, showing the buried emotions and psychological wounds of a character. For all the broad humor on display, Tammy does take some time to show how this woman feels marginalized and ignored by society. She's overweight, she has a menial job, and she's not very good at pleasing anyone. These things anger Tammy, and through the road trip with Pearl, she learns to stop letting other people define her. The movie deserves credit for attempting to inject some substance into its otherwise intentionally silly approach.

The down side is that Tammy perpetually feels a few good jokes away from being really funny. It repeatedly walks up to a line as though it's going to whip out some major, double-you-over-with-laughter zinger, then pulls back, going for a gag that's easier or more obvious. (Reminder: McCarthy falls down a lot in this picture.) The screenplay really needed an outside re-writer, someone to come in and bring shape to it, and to punch up the dialogue so that it had as much comedic impact as possible. McCarthy and Falcone lay some decent groundwork, yet perhaps lack the objectivity to make Tammy as no-holds-barred funny as it clearly wants to be.

All the actors (including Kathy Bates as an old family friend, and Alison Janney and Dan Aykroyd as Tammy's parents) do good work, and there are individual moments that elicit a chuckle or two. Many more scenes don't pay off as strongly as they initially promise. Tammy is passable for those who simply like watching this gifted actress do her thing (and I'm one of them), but there's no doubt she's done better films in the past and will do more in the future.

Blu-Ray Features:

Tammy comes to Blu-Ray in an extended cut that runs three minutes longer than the theatrical cut, which is also included. Other bonus goodies are a four-minute gag reel (which is fairly funny), five minutes of deleted scenes, and a “line-o-rama” of alternate jokes. “Tammy's Road Trip Check List,” meanwhile, is a five minute interview with McCarthy and Falcone.

An UltraViolet copy of the movie is also included.

( 1/2 out of four)


Tammy is rated R for language including sexual references. The running time is 1 hour and 40 minutes.


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