Unfrosted

Movie Name: Unfrosted
Year of Release: 2024
Director: Jerry Seinfeld
Starring: Jerry Seinfeld, Melissa McCarthy, Jim Gaffigan, Hugh Grant, Amy Schumer, Sarah Cooper, Christian Slater, Max Greenfield, Adrian Martinez, Bobby Moynihan, James Marsden, Jack McBrayer, Thomas Lennon, Bailey Sheetz, Eleanor Sweeney, Patrick Warburton, Drew Tarver, Mikey Day, Nelson Franklin, Kyle Dunnigan, John Forest, Dean Norris, Maria Bakalova, Peter Dinklage, Bill Burr, Jon Hamm, John Slattery, Fred Armisen, Darrell Hammond, Michael Joseph Pierce, Will Allan, Isaac Bae, Rachael Harris, Dan Levy
Genre: Comedy
Score out of ten (whole numbers only): 1
Watch it on Netflix

Synopsis and Review

It's hard to believe that it took this long for Jerry Seinfeld to make his feature directorial debut. The narrative takes place in 1963, in the city of Battle Creek, Michigan. It focuses its attention on Bob Cabbana, who works for the Kellogg's brand, and who is involved in a constant battle with other brands also delivering breakfast cereals. Kellogg's main rival is the Post brand, who Cabbana and his boss, the supportive and energetic Edsel Kellogg, believe has found a new ace (a new product) that can unbalance their position of supremacy on the breakfast table (the brands keep spying on each other in order to check what new products they're coming up with). In order to get further ahead, Cabbana suggests rehiring Stan, as in Donna Stankowski. She had previously worked for Kellogg's but was constantly battling Cabbana, though he admits her way of thinking may be what they need to put them once again squarely on the race for the lead (she's currently working for NASA). The Post brand, led by Marjorie Post, does have indeed a new product they think will revolutionize breakfasts everywhere, but are having some issues finessing the solution and putting it on the market. Everything gets more complicated for Post, when Cabbana and Stan get themselves a deal with El Sucre, to consume all available sugar. This forces Marjorie to go to Russia, and make unexpected deals. In the meantime, and following an inauspicious first attempt at creating a serious competitor to Post's product, Cabbana and Stan finally get the mix right, and uncover what they think is the winning solution for Kellogg's.

As I watched this film I couldn't help but think of some of the high school group projects that I worked on when I was a teenager. Myself and my friends did all sorts of projects, including one where we pretended to have an amateur television station, where we spoofed all sorts of tv shows (a la "Be Kind, Rewind"). We thought it was hilarious, and we were certain that everyone would find it hilarious as well. Turns out that wasn't the case. It wasn't that hilarious, and not many people were actually "on" the humor we all thought was "spot on". The reason I'm bringing this up, is that this film feels like a bigger budget version of what I described, performed by far more talented individuals. It also comes across as a vanity project, where someone has come up with a flimsy idea, and then has written a barely there script around it, with no characters to speak of, all wrapped in this very lush and expensive production. It's a film that tries so very hard to be funny and lighthearted, however unlike Steven Soderbergh's "The Informant!", which put a smart comedic spin on something serious, this film portrays this rivalry between these two entities almost like a childish type of feud, where everyone is winking at the audience, as if though all the characters are saying to us "we know how silly all this looks and sounds, but isn't it fun?". Sadly the answer is "no", and that's essentially because the film has absolutely no nuance, and the situations and "jokes" aren't in reality that funny (case in point, the helicopter that takes Cabbana to the White House catches him getting out of the shower, just with his bathrobe on, and when it takes off, the wind generated by the blades makes the robe fly out, funny right?). There are different ways to do satire, and while not everyone has to be ZAZ, or Billy Wilder, or Mel Brooks, the material still has to feel relevant, be populated by actual characters, and have some actual humor and dignity, and none of that can be traced here. The cast tries their best to bring some life to this material, but out of the immense talent that has been assembled, only Jim Gaffigan, Max Greenfield, and Kyle Dunnigan, actually create memorable performances (I'm still puzzled as to what was so compelling for Melissa McCarthy and Amy Schumer to be in this). Bill Pope's cinematography is impeccable, as is Clayton Hartley's production design, and Susan Matheson's costume design. This is a pop tart everyone should avoid.