Arizona

Arizona

There’s a great black comedy to be made about the subprime mortgage crisis that plunged the American economy into the toilet about ten years ago. “Arizona” a grim horror-comedy about a real estate agent (Rosemarie DeWitt) who gets kidnapped by one of her greedy boss’ pissed-off clients (Danny McBride) is not that film.

Nor would I ever want to see that movie, because while McBride and co-stars DeWitt, David Alan Grier, and Luke Wilson all bring their A-games to this unpleasantly broad satire, director Jonathan Watson and screenwriter Luke Del Tredici put so much blame on their hapless protagonists a bunch of selfish drips who are karmically paying for being selfish enough to dive into situations that, had they been less greedy, they’d realize were too good to be true that it often feels like an ugly sort of victim-blaming.

And McBride’s villain is also such a cartoonish oaf you half-expect him to wail that he’s only violent because he suffers from major “economic anxiety.” We get it, we did this to ourselves, thank you for that dazzling insight.

“Arizona” might have worked better as a smart-ass social commentary if its tsk-tsking of consumerist myopia wasn’t so consistently on the nose and its plot didn’t swiftly devolve into slasher movie cliches. DeWitt plays Cassie, a realtor who rushes into buying a house to get away from her condescending ex-husband Scott (Wilson). Now in major debt, Cassie is routinely harassed by bill collectors who threaten her seconds before they offer to help her; the most vicious cycle in modern finance is inadvertently broken when fellow mortgage-payer Sonny (McBride) accidentally kills Cassie’s smarmy boss (Seth Rogen).

But if you think our ill-fated heroes will escape their predicament without meeting the business end of a box cutter, a chainsaw, and/or an air-conditioning unit well, then you don’t know how these things work. So while “Arizona” may not be the movie we need right now about our current hellscape driven by greed and stupidity, it is definitely a film that exists.

On the way, they introduce supporting characters a trigger-happy cop (Grier) and a clueless security guard (Travis Hammer) chief among them largely to underscore their pettiness and incompetence. All of these people have legitimate financial worries, but they’re all too obnoxious to be worth caring about: Grier may be the only policeman in town, but he also doesn’t appear to know how to handle either of his guns.

And maybe Hammer’s character hasn’t been paid on time, but he uses that as an excuse to not help Cassie when she begs him to help her. It’s unclear what crime Cassie’s teenage daughter Kelsey (Elizabeth Gillies) committed, but maybe she just … likes exercising at home?

Anyway, Sonny is clearly the worst of this bunch. He is introduced driving his girlfriend’s car, a gas-guzzling Hummer with the words “Bad Bitch” stenciled on the windshield; that image pretty much says everything you need to know about the film’s sense of humor and social commentary.

McBride does the best he can with his desperate antagonist, though he is often better than his tiresome character deserves. He even sells a dumb gag where Sonny now angry because he can’t get on with his day tries to use a souped-up remote control to turn his television on; he frantically mashes buttons before lowering his blinds instead.

McBride nails this scene by sulking quietly while the blinds slowly descend: A less assured comedian might try to add something extra here. But McBride does just as much by sitting still and letting it happen behind him, leaving himself alone in total darkness. McBride should be awarded something like the Peter Sellers Award for Most Inspired Comedic Performance in an Undeserving Role.

Unfortunately, Sonny is too pathetic to be anything good or bad, boasting as he does about playing golf against his doctor’s advice (guess what happens next). He unfailingly and loudly blames others for his destructive behavior: “Why did she have to do this? She didn’t have to do this! She could have been nice.”

Sonny also literally turns an angry dog loose on Cassie moments before the dog turns around and goes after him instead. Never mind trying to understand what caused Sonny, or any of these people, to leap head-first into financial ruin; all we need is that they did, and therefore deserve everything that’s coming to them. If you find that funny, wait’ll you see this mirror.

Watch Arizona For Free On Gomovies.