Downhill ★★½
IT’S a very fine line between comedy and drama, especially when you try to merge the two.
In 2014, Swedish director Ruben Ostlund pulled it off exceptionally well with a film called Force Majeure.
It told the story of a family on a skiing holiday whose lives are upended when the husband seemingly deserts his wife and children in the face of a potential tragedy.
Force Majeure worked because it restricted the comedy to the characters and kept the script primarily focused on the drama and was extremely well acted.
Ostlund went on to make The Square in 2017 which I haven’t seen but understand it succeeds in a similar way.
So, it saddens me to report that the 2020 American remake, Downhill, is a shadow of the original film in almost every way.
Even if you haven’t seen the original, you will struggle to settle in to the film because its tone is all over the place, one moment wacky comedy, the next awkward satire and, occasionally, attempts at straight drama.
This from Nat Faxon and Jim Rash, the directing/writing team responsible for The Descendants (2011) and the wonderful The Way, Way Back in 2013 and additional writer Jesse Armstrong (Succession, The Thick of It, In the Loop).
Will Ferrell is Pete and Julia Louis-Dreyfus is Billie, a married couple on vacation with their two young sons in the Alps.
In the original film we learned more about the couple and their dynamic before the triggering incident. In this remake we learn almost nothing. First problem.
The family are at lunch one afternoon on a restaurant balcony when they hear an explosion up in the mountains and snow starts to fall. It’s one of those controlled avalanches, but they don’t realise.
As the snow starts to gain volume and get closer, it feels like it’s about to engulf them and, in the ensuing panic, Pete grabs his phone and takes off.
In the original film, the avalanche appears far more threatening and it’s much clearer that Pete flees with no regard for his family. Second problem.
The incident throws not just their relationship into doubt but the dynamic of their entire family, forcing them to re-evaluate their lives together.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus is quite good but there is a particularly bad scene between her and a younger man in a ski hut that falls flat. But the biggest problem is the miscasting of Will Ferrell who doesn’t capture any of the nuances required.
It’s another example of why Americans should stick with their own brand of comedy rather than trying to emulate the Europeans.