Killing your boss is something many of us privately fanaticise about. That’s the promising idea of this latest comedy from director Seth Gordon.
Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, Jason Sudeikis star as the three victims of power-hungry employers – Kevin Spacey on brilliantly dry form as a corporate manager, Jennifer Anniston as a nymphomaniac dentist and Colin Farrell as a coke-head. In an attempt to rid themselves of these tyrants they hatch a plan to kill all three and agree to let one of the other people do the dirty work so they cannot be linked to the murder. In many ways the film is a hark-back to the Strangers on a Train premise – something which the film actually references. It starts off in a highly entertaining manner as we are introduced to the three gloriously over-the-top bosses.
All three chew the scenery and carry off their parts with relish and indeed the film is at its best when these three are onscreen. However the film loses its way around the half way mark and feels at least twenty minutes too long. What could have been a relatively short, sharp, B-movie comedy becomes a by-the-numbers affair with the usual lengthy bumbling protagonist routine. I was feeling restless by the time they entered the separate houses and actually wished for more screen time with the bosses themselves. Scenarios appear which, although entertaining on their own, do little to move the story forward – a cameo by Jamie Foxx is a prime example.
It’s no help that the three leads range from being entertaining to annoying and both Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis unfortunately fall into the latter category. The squeaky, high-pitched clumsiness from Day’s character becomes irritating and Jason’s Sudeikis’s womaniser comes off as unsympathetic. As mentioned the film does have a few very funny moments but one can’t help but feel that a tighter film is lurking in there somewhere.
While by no means “horrible”, Bosses is a comedy that underperforms.
