Apatow Sensibilities, Schumer Treatment

Film: Trainwreck
Cast Amy Schumer, Bill Hader, Brie Larson, LeBron James
Director: Judd Apatow

What’s a fine line? How do you tread it? The fine line between satire and insult? Between black and disgusting humour? Between incredible improvisation and incredibly boring? Between girl power and girls doing the boy thing? The more you think about it the more realise that this line, like everything else, is different for different people. Judd Apatow made a career – and careers of a few of his friends – by treading the fine line between treading many a fine line and pretending to do so. And he is back with Trainwreck, the first feature he is directing that he has not scripted.

Amy (Schumer) has casual one-night-stands, probably more than once a night. She hates commitment, even though she is kind of with a guy. She drinks incessantly, even though she hates the hangovers. She talks crass, even though she is supposed to work on an upper-class lifestyle magazine. On other words, she does everything the Seth Rogen prototype does, except, of course, she is a ‘she’. 

Amy is like this because, you guessed it, she has Daddy issues. A hilarious flashback right at the start establishes that. She is going steady with Steven (John Cena), but still hooks up with others whenever she has a chance. A chance decision by her editor Dianna (Tilda Swinton) leads Amy to Dr Aaron Connors (Hader), a sports-injury physician. One thing leads to another. Thing is, can Amy hold it together?

Judd Apatow was apparently so taken up with Amy Schumer’s script that he agreed to direct another person’s screenplay for the first time in his directing career. It would have been nice to see that script though, because Trainwreck feels nothing other than a typical Judd Apatow movie. And I don’t mean it in a bad way. 

Apatow is famous for plonking his camera in the middle and letting his actors take the show forward. It works at times, with some great jokes, a sense of naturalism comes through, you see characters as people, with seemingly real emotions, awkward silences, unintentional stammering and the like. On the flip side, the movie tends to drag. When the joke is long drawn out, the time taken is also the same. And not all jokes are funny. Trainwreck is the same. It has its moments and it has its shouldn’t-have-been moments.

A big plus for the movie is its performances. Bill Hader is sweet as the good guy, but with insecurities. Tilda Swinton disappears into another role and look that I had to find out from the credits. Basketball great LeBron James has a very meaty role. And, here’s the surprise, he doesn’t screw it up. There are big name cameos aplenty, some of which work while some fall flat. Even John Cena plays the male version of the dumb blonde – the stupid sports jock – with a lot of enthusiasm. 

Amy Schumer, however, does not come across as perfect. Which shouldn’t have been the case because this is her vehicle. But then again a lot of it may be because of how unlikeable her character is. Unlikeable, not annoying. But then one realises how much of our perception of a performance is rooted in how we relate with the character. Amy does herself no credit and it is a warts-and-all depiction. 

Trainwreck is chock-a-block with clichés but also has a lot of heart. Amy Schumer tells an everyday rom com story, but tries to infuse it with a dose of realism that is more than what you expect. She tries to walk the thin line. But then in a Judd Apatow movie, the line is never stationary. Maybe, just maybe, despite all its crassness and overgrown-girl-in-a-women’s-body vibe, Trainwreck might have benefitted from a more traditional direction than Apatow’s. But, then again, that’s me walking the thin line.