Stop me if you’ve heard this one before—a romantic couple witnesses a murder or otherwise gets caught up in some nefarious dealings, and they spend the rest of the night running away from whoever’s chasing them while also trying to solve the case and getting themselves into increasingly implausible and comedic situations.
Ok, obviously I know you have heard this one before, it’s the premise of any number of wacky comedies over the past couple decades, movies like Date Night and Game Night. Which isn’t to say it’s not a successful formula, some of those movies are really fun.
The latest doesn’t have the word “Night” in the title, but it’s pretty much the same thing—it’s the Netflix movie The Lovebirds, starring Kumail Nanjiani of The Big Sick and Issa Rae from HBO’s “Insecure” as the couple, who in this case have just broken up before the hijinks get going. You don’t need the plot, you already know it-- what we’re really here for is the jokes. And yeah, some of them are lazy, and some bits go on way too long. But I, at least, laughed throughout, sometimes loudly, because the two leads are just very, very funny people, who I assume improvised many of the best lines. And really, who cares about the rest?
One story I know you haven’t heard before, though, is the one told in the documentary The Painter and The Thief. It’s about an artist in Norway who has a couple of very high dollar pieces stolen from a gallery, and then essentially forces herself into the personal life of one of the thieves, who turns out to be a drug addict and semi-career criminal who is maybe not actually that terrible a guy. It’s the sort of story you’d roll your eyes hard at if it were fiction, but since it’s not, it’s a riveting look at compassion, trauma, and the many different faces of self-destruction. And the way the circle ultimately closes by the end is pretty remarkable. If you’re up for it, you can support Wichita’s Mamafilm microcinema by renting The Painter and the Thief through their website at mama.film.
