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In one of the early scenes of Me Time, the latest Netflix comedy, we see a conversation between a husband and wife that tiptoes around an argument. Regina Hall’s measured Maya is encouraging Kevin Hart’s uptight Sonny to loosen up a bit. Despite this, he is fixated on his own insecurities as a stay-at-home parent and keeps circling back to how he was uncomfortable with an interaction that happened at a dinner they just attended. At one point, Hall utters a simple “what?” in response to the rambling bit Hart is attempting to get out. This one word, with how genuinely perplexed it feels, ends up being infinitely funnier than anything else that takes place over nearly two hours. Though Maya was responding to the convoluted way that Sonny was attempting to justify his controlling tendencies, she very well could have been commenting on the baffling and unfunny film itself.
The premise is a simple one, as it follows Sonny as he takes a few days to himself while Maya takes their kids on a trip to visit family. It soon becomes clear that he doesn’t really have many friends or anyone to actually connect with during this free time. He initially just gets caught up in embarrassing situations surrounding masturbation, barbeque, and golf (a real holy trinity of insecure masculinity). Eventually, he decides to reconnect with his old friend Huck (Mark Wahlberg), who is throwing an expensive birthday celebration for himself. It has been years since they have hung out, something Sonny explains was intentional, as he felt he had outgrown their friendship. An opening flashback scene, via some rather clunky effects, offers a hint of what he means by this when the duo attempts a stunt that goes awry. However, despite his reservations, Sonny decides to finally agree to Huck’s many pleas to hang out as they used to. They each don matching tracksuits and hit the road on a tacky party bus.
The story then becomes about all the shenanigans the two men will get up to. There is an attack by a mountain lion, a run-in with an imposing loan shark, recurring situations involving poop, and an extended cameo appearance. It is everything you would expect from a more mainstream comedy like this, down to the overly sentimental final act that drags on and on in an attempt to instill some sort of lasting lesson. The unfortunate thing is that the film is rarely funny and often feels uncertain about what it actually wants to be. The early scenes of slapstick, something that can be an art form when done well, only end up feeling hollow and noncommittal. An attempt to pivot to be a more wild adventure falls flat as well when the film just takes us right back to where we started with only a handful of recurring gags that it cycles through. It is all formula and no fun, putting us in situation after situation that it stretches to a breaking point in the hope of getting something going to justify a rather lengthy runtime that feels even longer. You soon realize this is a film of rapidly diminishing comedic returns.
Me Time is written and directed by long-time comedy filmmaker John Hamburg (I Love You, Man) though it feels more like it was designed by a committee rather than a person with a vision. While Hamburg’s last film Why Him? was not particularly successful at what it set out to achieve, there was at least a sense that there was some sort of driving force behind it. That is entirely absent here. Me Time just goes through the motions of a wacky comedy without any of the actually funny components. It feels like it is holding itself back from making that necessary leap into absurdity as everything plays out just as you would expect. Above all else, a good comedy requires some element of surprise to it. While there are a couple of moments of this, one involving a tortoise and the other a sudden car crash, they are completely buried under a lot of set-up that all eventually arrive at comedic dead ends.
Oddly, some of the funnier jokes and interactions come when we cut away from the main duo to check in with Maya off with the rest of the family. Much of this is due to Hall, whose wit largely goes wasted beyond these short sequences and her sense of comedic timing. On the other side of this are Hart and Wahlberg, who lack the necessary chemistry to carry the rest of the film on their own. While the material itself wasn’t doing them any favors, the performances they give both feel one note and unimaginative. Even the most straightforward of comedies can be elevated by the committed comedic presence of the actors at the core, though that is never felt here. Instead, we get scenes like the aforementioned cameo where there is no joke for the person appearing to be a part of other than the randomness of them being there.
There are also repeated references to stand-up comedy as Sonny’s son shares how he enjoys watching everyone from Bill Burr to Tiffany Haddish. While it soon becomes clear that this is to set up how the young kid wants to take a different path for an upcoming talent show, where he is supposed to play piano that he hasn’t been practicing, it just served as a constant reminder of how light on actual jokes the film is. While they are vastly different forms of comedy, the jokes from even the most average stand-up special far surpass anything taking part here. Hart is one of those very performers and there are moments in the film where it almost seems like he is doing a bit just as he would on stage. The issue is that it doesn’t ever connect in the same way as it does when it is just him as the film doesn’t have the patience or direction necessary to actually build on them. Each only ends up feeling like little asides, as if Hart was just riffing, and they left it in there when they realized they didn’t have that much else going on in the way of comedy. Perhaps the most unexpected takeaway from it all is that this makes Hart’s prior film on the streamer from this year, The Man from Toronto, look much better by comparison. Then again, this isn’t a compliment to either.
Rating: D-
Me Time comes to Netflix on August 26.
