- Life of the Party
- Directed by: Ben Falcone
- Written by: Ben Falcone, Melissa McCarthy
- Starring: Melissa McCarthy
- Classification: PG; 105 minutes
More than once in the safe Hollywood comedy Life of the Party, star Melissa McCarthy proclaims she is “down to clown.” And isn’t that the truth. A truly gifted comedic actress, McCarthy is wasting her talents with this vanilla-flavoured story about a soon-to-be divorced mom heading back to university, where she shares friends with her undergrad daughter and seamlessly becomes what the film’s title says she is. Another comedy from McCarthy’s writer-director husband Ben Falcone, Life of the Party gets nothing more than a satisfactory grade. Funny-enough scenes move more or less randomly along, as a midlife crisis-ing mom transitions from frumpy to cool, while winning over the sorority set with her admirable unsinkability. She does tequila. She beds a boy. She aces her studies. The film’s mild source of tension (involving financial stress) is wonky and flies in the face of modern divorce laws. Mom needs a better lawyer; McCarthy needs a better agent. Shouldn’t she have graduated by now?