TL;DR – While it is not anything new, the film focuses on women supporting women and that helps elevate it.    

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

Review – There is nothing quite like the pain of something lost, time might heal all wounds but it also makes the deepest cuts. This is especially true when the thing that is lost is a romantic relationship. What do you do when nine years of your life disappears overnight, how do you process that pain. Well, today we look at a film that explores all of that.   

So to set the scene, we open with Jenny (Gina Rodriguez) alone sitting in the subway obviously in a state of distress. She had finally gotten the job of her dreams after years of hard work, but it involves moving from New York to San Francisco and her partner of nine years Nate (Lakeith Stanfield) decided that he was not prepared to even try a long distance relationship. Everything is changing in her life but there is still one constant and that is her best friends Blair (Brittany Snow) and Erin (DeWanda Wise) still have her back. So as a way of helping to cope and to celebrate her new life and commiserate her moving away the three decide to go to Neon Classic a concert from their youths and have one last crazy adventure.   

One of the things I really liked about Someone Great is the undercurrent of women supporting women. Her friends are there for her, they support her through this difficult time, they sing with her, make sure she does not go off the deep end. It is that level of support that you get from a deep friendship but it does not stop there. It is reinforced all throughout the film, like when Jenny runs into Hannah (Rosario Dawson), Nate’s cousin. The moment she finds out that they had broken up the conversation immediately changes tone as she hugs Jenny and tells her that it will be all right and if she ever needs someone to talk to she is here. This is the first film I have ever seen that has women in most of the major positions including Director, Writer, Cinematographer, Composer, and it really translates onto the screen.   

The setup is not anything we have not seen before in some form, it sort of combines the ‘you just got dumped, let’s go get you drunk and thinking of something else’ and the ‘you are moving away so let’s have one last adventure’ kind of story. However, what elevates it is the commitment of the three leads to make it work. You really feel like they are old friends who know each other deeply. They are also going through their own issues with relationships, like stagnation and lack of commitment, this creates the narrative framework that makes the movie flow. As well as this, I like that as the film went on, they complicated what seems like a simple reason for the end of the relationship.  

However, this is an American hard R rated movie so going in you can expect a lot of drugs, sex, and language. It is not nearly as bad as a lot of films I have seen, that takes the R rating as an excuse to just do anything. Indeed, most of it does feel contextual to the situation, especially for Jenny that going through the breakup. However, it does start to get tiresome after a while and it does feel like at times it is used to sort of pave over some of the cracks in the story.

In the end, do we recommend Someone Great? Yes, and No. This is going to be a very contextual film for people as to if they will connect with it or not. There is a lot of drugs, sex, and language which will be an instant deal breaker for some, but there is also a heart-warming story of female empowerment and the strength of good friendships. I quite enjoyed my time with the film, but I don’t think I have any compunction to ever go back and revisit it.    

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

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Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Someone Great
Directed by –     Jennifer Kaytin Robinson
Screenplay by – Jennifer Kaytin Robinson
Music by – Germaine Franco
Cinematography by – Autumn Eakin
Edited by – Jeffrey Wolf
Production/Distribution Companies – Feigco Entertainment, I Can & I Will Productions, Likely Story & Netflix
Starring – Gina Rodriguez, Brittany Snow, DeWanda Wise, Lakeith Stanfield, Alex Moffat, Peter Vack, Rebecca Naomi Jones, Rosario Dawson, RuPaul Charles, Michelle Buteau, Jaboukie Young-White & Ben Sidell       
Rating – Australia: MA15+; United States: R