Review: Snatched

Pairing Amy Schumer and Goldie Hawn in a comedic romp should be cause for celebration. After all, Schumer has become the leading female comic star in recent years, what with her sketch comedy television series Inside Amy Schumer and 2015's Trainwreck bringing her both critical and commercial successes. Hawn is a comic legend, first surfacing on the scene as Laugh-In's effervescent kook before becoming an Academy Award-winning actress who took charge of her career by also becoming a producer (most notably on Private Benjamin, arguably her most famous role). Hawn paved the way for someone like Schumer (and, really, any rom-com star from Julia Roberts to Cameron Diaz to Reese Witherspoon worth their salt), so their teaming is akin to two generations of comic royalty banding together to deliver fun, laughs, and good times.

Except they've been trapped in Snatched, which is less a romp than a slog and an increasingly unfunny one at that. Since they are who they are, Schumer and Hawn remain endearingly watchable, doing their best to breathe some signs of life in D.O.A. material, but Snatched seems constructed to thwart their attempts at every turn.

The prelude is by far the best thing about the film with Schumer immediately firing comic jabs as the lovable loser with the potty mouth. Schumer's Emily Middleton is seen mulling over wardrobe choices for her impending trip to Ecuador with her musician boyfriend Michael (Randall Park). Turns out she's actually the sales clerk, not the customer, and she's duly fired for not exactly giving it her all. Her response? A characteristically Schumer one: "I wouldn't work here if you paid me." As if losing her job isn't bad enough, Michael breaks up with her, leaving her stranded with a non-refundable holiday package. After failing to get any of her supposed friends to accompany here, she convinces her mom Linda (Hawn) to come along after seeing a photo album of her mom in her younger, more carefree days. Who is this woman and where has she been? Emily thinks, looking at the woman she's always known as overprotective and unadventurous.

They arrive in Ecuador and the film really starts to unravel. After some poolside banter ("Why are you dressed like Powder?" Emily asks her covered-up mom; "I didn't know they had a day care program at the hotel," Linda remarks after seeing an older man and a much-younger woman walk by), the film proceeds to lurch from one tired scene to another. Emily is taken in by a handsome Brit (Tom Bateman), who entices her with booze-fuelled capoeira parties and promises of more adventures. Except what he delivers to Emily and tagalong Linda is a stay in one of South American's grungiest cells with some fairly scary men as their hosts. The rest of the film tracks mother and daughter bonding as they escape from their captors and try to find their way out of the jungle and return back home.

There's really not much to say about a film that not only manages to squander Schumer and Hawn but also Wanda Sykes and especially Joan Cusack, the latter pair cast as "platonic friends." There are some sight gags, including one involving a tapeworm being pulled out of Emily's throat which, much like Snatched, goes nowhere fast and stays there for longer than it should.

Snatched

Directed by: Jonathan Levine

Written by: Katie Dippold

Starring: Amy Schumer, Goldie Hawn, Christopher Meloni, Ike Barinholtz, Joan Cusack, Wanda Sykes, Randall Park, Tom Bateman