There's some inspired left-field wackiness, like Larry Dorf as a security guard who's "into demons." Peter Dinklage as Michelle's former lover Renault, a puffed-up businessman with a Japanese-culture fetish and a katana collection, is a particularly surreal touch. The three of them give the film plenty of comic momentum, with cartoon-physics violence and rag-doll bodies flying through the air. McCarthy co-wrote The Boss' screenplay with her husband, Ben Falcone (who also directs, and cameos as Michelle's lawyer) and Steve Mallory, who helped write the Michelle Darnell sketches back in the Groundlings days. It's a sloppy-comedy version of Woody Allen's Blue Jasmine, with less Streetcar Named Desire baggage, and more vagina-related dialogue. But first, there's a lot of comic business about what an awful houseguest she is, what an unrepentant and messy slob she is, and how ill-equipped she is to deal with poverty. Eventually, Michelle hatches a scheme to make money by exploiting Claire's talents and Rachel's age group. So in short order, Michelle is jailed for inside trading, loses everything, and moves in with her saintly former assistant Claire (Kristen Bell) and Claire's open-hearted tween daughter Rachel (Ella Anderson). Naturally, someone who rejects family ties and personal loyalty needs to learn the value of both by the end of the film. It's 'Blue Jasmine,' with more vagina jokesĮssentially, she's a McCarthified version of the Hateful Film Businessman, glued to his cell phone and perpetually missing his kids' piano recitals or sporting events, and primed for a magical lesson about what's really important in life. As an adult, she preaches that philosophy to the cheering hordes at glitzy motivational seminars, where she enters on the back of a golden phoenix shooting fireworks, duets on "All I Do Is Win" with T-Pain, then tells her rabid fans that other people are anchors tying them down, and they need to cut everyone loose and set sail. An opening montage lays out the core of Michelle's personality: summarily rejected by three adoptive families in a row, repeatedly dumped back on the steps of her Catholic orphanage like an unwanted puppy, she consciously decided that family and emotional ties were useless and limiting. Here, she revives a character she created during her stint in Los Angeles' comedy troupe The Groundlings: arrogant, ultra-rich mogul Michelle Darnell, who built her multiple Fortune 500 companies from the ground up.
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And for McCarthy, nothing is safer than charging ahead at full speed and full intensity. It's middle-of-the-road comedy, playing it slick and safe.
The Boss still isn't likely to be the film that wins over McCarthy's detractors, or drives off her fans.
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But it turns The Boss into a slick shrug of a movie that feels closer to an Adam Sandler comedy than to McCarthy's past projects. That's such a minor change, and it's only really evident in a few minutes of the film. It has the requisite low-point moments, but it mysteriously plays them as though they barely matter. But The Boss never finds the sincerity to go with the shrieking. It mostly follows the pattern, with McCarthy playing another smug trash-talker who hides a lifetime of wounded desperation under her vulgar, unapologetic, hilariously selfish surface. So her new comedy, The Boss, feels like a significant and regrettable break with tradition. No matter how hyper and vulgar the comedy beats became, she always managed to inject some touching pathos and humanity into her characters, at least for a few minutes at a time. McCarthy has always used those moments to remind her fans that she has dramatic talents, as well as comedic ones. And like clockwork, at least once per movie, those characters hit a low point where they lay their vulnerabilities bare. But they all have sweet, soft secret hearts. Her movie characters are brash loudmouths, squalling and swearing to fend off their loneliness and regret. I will do absolutely anything you want in this film, as long as there's one scene where I actually get to act." For the past five years, the films she's headlined - Identity Thief, The Heat, Tammy, and Spy - have piled on the pratfalls and fat jokes. Ever since 2011's Bridesmaids, Melissa McCarthy's films have played as though she walked into the studio before shooting began and told the producers, "Here's the deal.
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