Anyone But You: Box Office Winner But A 'Bummer' In Other Ways

Will Gluck’s Anyone But You was a huge success when it hit theatres at the end of December. Now streaming on Netflix, Anyone But You is a bummer in more ways than one. One of the supposedly big gags involves the hero’s bum. But, we shall get to that later.

To begin with, Anyone But You is a bit of an anomaly.

I wish I could say it is an adult comedy. Sex jokes abound. But they are all of the kind that teenagers share among each other on WhatsApp. To their credit, the lead actors Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell share a mercurial vibe, which furnishes a crackling edge to an otherwise vapid romcom, or ‘rom-con’, as the blurbs cockily declare.

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Essentially, this is a new-age reworking of the Doris Day-Rock Hudson romances from the 1950s when the couple loved to hate one another, throwing barbs, until we had to exclaim Barb re barb!

The writing in Anyone But You is at times, quite peppy. The prologue when Harry Meets Sally, sorry, Bea meets Ben involves a loo in a café. It is actually a rock-solid start. The one-night stands that follows (a bit like One Day with sex) ends in disaster when Bea overhears Ben bitching about her to a friend on the phone. I am not too sure he means what he says.

Then begins the prolonged antagonism. Bea and Ben’s mutual malevolence is more de-energising for the audience than for the couple who know they are acting hostile (on two levels) and we know that they know which makes it an almost an unbearable charade for us.

We have to sit and watch them bickering knowing full well where this is going: to a wedding, that’s where. The entire wedding episode (a lesbian wedding, if you must know) which occupies the main course of the junk feast, is done in shades that are at once familiar and wispy.

I liked the character of the 'other woman' thrown into the wedding feast just for added flavour but Charlee Fraser, as Margaret, is able to stand her ground even when it gets slippery.

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As long as the bickering is inoffensive, it is fine. But then the humour gets anal, quite literally. There is a whole prolonged episode where Bea reaches into Ben’s buttocks and extracts a crab. This is where the film lost its cuteness and became seriously lurid. It’s like a Disney film suddenly assuming the lurid colours of American Pie movies. This episode is brought to us by sheer serendipity. What a pity!

The entire efficacy of the romcom hinges on the counter-chemistry between the bickering couple, and the ability of the supporting cast to look like wedding guests who care about what happens to the truculent ‘row’-mantic couple.

In the end, the cast is well-tuned with the sheer nullity of the plot. If you are one of those moviegoers who is not too much into nuances in a romantic alliance, then Anyone But You will keep you involved in its incurable silliness.