‘Another Simple Favor’ review: A heavy cocktail

The Prime Video sequel Another Simple Favor, with Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick returning, proves that more can often be less.

Falling somewhere between Gone Girl and Where’d You Go, Bernadette in the “mom airport lit” adaptation lineage of the 2010s, 2018’s satirically splashy A Simple Favor was an appealing and occasionally stylish effort from Paul Feig, a director not well-known for his cinematic flavor. Benefited mainly by its outstanding costuming, sharp sets, and cheekily excellent performance from Blake Lively, this cinematic take on Darcey Bell’s 2017 novel became a sweet little sleeper hit, nearly grossing nearly $100 million worldwide on a slim $20 million budget. Those numbers don’t necessarily guarantee a sequel, but that didn’t stop Feig, Lively, and crew from swinging over to Prime Video seven years later (!) to greenlight a fashionable follow-up, Another Simple Favor.

But here’s the thing: this streaming follow-up isn’t based on any source material, as returning screenwriter Jessica Sharzer, alongside Laeta Kalogridis (Shutter Island), takes more creative reins, but it does seem to borrow a page from HBO’s The White Lotus. I say that because we travel over to Capri, Italy, this time around, with Lively’s cunning, sharply-dressed convict Emily Nelson out of jail (through some movie legal mumbo-jumbo) and planning a lavish destination wedding. Indeed, Emily is set to marry a wealthy, handsome Italian heir with some not-subtle criminal connections, and she wants her best frenemy, Stephanie Smothers (Anna Kendrick), a.k.a. the woman directly responsible for her once-extensive prison stay, as her maid of honor.

Style over substance.

As fans of the first movie likely know, there’s always mystery, mayhem, and some mean martinis wherever Emily goes, and this steamy successor tries to double all three. The buddy-bickering chemistry shared between Kendrick and Lively in Another Simple Favor is amiable for twenty to thirty minutes. It makes this sequel seem like an agreeably slight send-up to the original. There’s a low-energy, but casually amusing vibe to the antics. Even though the main characters are set to travel halfway around the world, there’s a lazy-but-good-natured charm to seeing these actors get another chance to relish these roles again. Lively, in particular, always has a ball when she wears Emily’s lavish shoes. Much like the original, Another Simple Favor is at its best whenever the actress and her outrageous and theatrical outfits take the spotlight to dazzle and charm us.

Much like the original, Lively needs to be away from center stage for long periods to maintain Emily’s mystique. And while Kendrick can be winsome as a lead, Another Simple Favor is adrift (more so than the first movie) whenever it has to focus on Stephanie. Because there’s no source material to base the character on here, Stephanie follows the Feig formula and becomes more coarse and outspoken. That can be a little likable at the forefront, but proves tiresome when her character becomes flat and disinteresting. Kendrick tries her best, yet still seems lost in what to do with a character who doesn’t evolve in any particularly fresh or exciting way. There are several opportunities to make her more campy and outrageous. Sadly, outside of one enjoyable scene involving a shot of “truth serum,” Kendrick is left with a blandly two-dimensional version of Stephanie that ends up dull.

Sour and stupid.

It’s tough finding that balance between silly and sensational. While the original Simple Favor is not a perfect movie by any stretch of the imagination, at least it has a better understanding of how to capture that pulpy, propulsive charm of an airport read turned big-screen spectacle. In contrast, Another Simple Favor amps up the silliness to a fatal degree. By the time we get into the nitty-gritty of the plot, it’s so stupidly nutty that it’s hard to get invested in even for a casual movie night. The entertainment value was more apparent in the last outing because there was a tongue planted in its cheek as far as sending up all the heightened absurdities of suburban moms obsessing over murder mysteries. By shipping them (and us) to Italy, it loses whatever satirical focus it was aiming for this time, and it just becomes really dumb.

This is where the White Lotus comparison comes into sharp contrast. While that show isn’t without its occasional missteps, creator Mike White knows how to add elements of murder, mystery, interpersonal conflicts, burning resentments, and exotic locales into a pressure cooker of delightfulness. Another Simple Favor certainly has those elements in place, but never in a particularly focused or exciting way. To put it simply, it’s not a good sign when I spend a fair share of this film thinking about how much I would rather catch up on the show, especially when this sequel (which, I’ll note, I saw in theaters) is heading straight to streaming. It’s not like Another Simple Favor is a disaster, though. It’s just all the cocktail ingredients are in an improper balance, with heaps of spice thrown in to make it more exotic and palatable. That only deludes things more, leaving an unsatisfying aftertaste.

The bottom line.

I will be the first to admit that I haven’t kept very close ties with Feig’s work after his small leap to streaming. But unlike some of Feig’s filmmaking peers, the Freaks and Geeks creator is more suited for the small screen. His work has favored TV-esque compositions, anyway. Unlike, say, the Knives Out films, it made sense to turn this franchise turn to streaming fodder. Nevertheless, that change only highlights how much Another Simple Favor needs cinematic pop to work. Lively brings it in strides, but she’s doing all the heavy lifting again. The onslaught of obtuseness weighs her down too much to make it work for this adventure (her androgynous fashion sense still remains fabulous). That’s doubly a shame for what should be a weightless trifle of a sequel.

Another Simple Favor streams exclusively on Prime Video starting May 1. Watch the trailer here.

Images courtesy of Lorenzo Sisti/Amazon MGM Studios. Read more articles by Will Ashton here.

Will Ashton