A Simple Favour, released back in 2018, turned out to be the ideal lockdown film come 2020. It summoned high glamour and high drama in the same domestic settings everyone found themselves stuck in, as mommy vlogger Stephanie Smothers (Anna Kendrick) became embroiled in the Gone Girl-esque faked death of Emily Nelson (Blake Lively), with one martini consumed for every ludicrous plot twist.
While it did well during its theatrical release, it became a downright sensation on Prime Video during the pandemic, leading Amazon to the natural conclusion that it needed a sequel tout de suite, despite its director Paul Feig (of Bridesmaids and Spy fame) having never indulged in one before. And, really, a film about two women – one the perky naïf and the other the elusive seductress – revealing so many secrets that they become borderline unrecognisable to each other doesn’t naturally lend itself to more plot. There’s also the small matter of Emily being in jail.
Yet returning writer Jessica Sharzer, and new co-writer Laeta Kalogridis, have responded simply by acknowledging that unnaturalness and leaning so far into absurdity that their sequel, succinctly named Another Simple Favour, threatens to topple headfirst over the railings. It’s noticeably less sharp, dark, and sexy, but also far more giddily camp than what came before. That makes it prime material, really, for a straight-to-streaming release. The narrative turns are wild, but plainly laid out, while its storyline conveniently requires Stephanie and Emily to pack their bags and head to the luxurious island of Capri.
Stephanie, in the aftermath of her tussle with convicted murderer Emily, has pivoted from mommy vlogger to mommy-slash-true-crime vlogger, and is currently on the circuit promoting her new book about her experiences, The Faceless Blonde. Emily crashes one of her bookstore signings in a prison-stripe suit and announces she’s freshly out of the clink and about to get married. She’d love – nay, compels via blackmail – Stephanie to be her bridesmaid. Is it all an elaborate trap to enact her vengeance and chuck her body over a cliff? Maybe! Whatever happens, it’ll make a good sequel to the book.
There’s a bit of mafia action thanks to Emily’s fiancée, Dante (Michele Morrone), and some borderline Italian giallo chicanery with gloves, murders, and family secrets. Emily’s mother (Elizabeth Perkins, replacing Jean Smart), aunt Linda (Allison Janney), and ex-husband Sean (Henry Golding) all have a part to play. Feig’s always been generous with his actors, most especially his actresses. His women have been given the freedom to be remorselessly nasty yet somehow wholesome, with Emily’s favourite aside to Stephanie (“brotherf***er”), here delivered with the enthusiasm of a bear hug.
Lively, especially, has found the perfect angle with Emily. She’s a delightful creation, taking all that languorous, cool girl inflection of hers and poisoning it with little more than a well-placed smirk or the cock of her head. She’s careful to never overplay a scene, knowing that Renée Ehrlich Kalfus’s costumes do so much of the talking. Emily’s appearance in an oversized straw hat drew gasps from the audience. There’s a blood-red trim to her wedding dress’s veil, while, in another scene, she rocks up in a full-blown Al Capone look. These are costumes you simultaneously laugh at and envy.
Certainly, there’s a sense that Another Simple Favour is short-changing its own material. Sharzer and Kalogridis float a critique of the true crime industrial complex past our eyes, only to pull their punches at the crucial moment. But, clearly, Another Simple Favour has no aspirations beyond being a quick morsel. And a morsel it is.
Dir: Paul Feig. Starring: Anna Kendrick, Blake Lively, Andrew Rannells, Bashir Salahuddin, Elizabeth Perkins, Henry Golding, Allison Janney. Cert 15, 120 minutes.
‘Another Simple Favour’ streams on Prime Video from 1 May
