To start, Management is described as a comedy. Good you say to yourself, I could do with a laugh. Steve Zahn has been many comedies, usually as a goofy guy so that should be good. Then there is Jennifer Aniston. She has attempted comedies before creating a few laughs so she should be interesting to watch. Lastly there is Woody Harrelson, a man guaranteed to get you in stitches. However this was not the case.
To start there is the oddly boring plot. Mike (Zahn) works at his parent’s motel as a night manager. Sue (Aniston) visits, the two get intimate and Mike becomes obsessed with her. She leaves, he follows her, the two get to know each other but untimely Mike leaves. After more comings and goings as well as Sue getting back with her ex-punk boyfriend Jango (Harrelson), revealing she is getting married and is pregnant, Mike’s crush remains. When he is given the deed to the motel he decides to turn it into a homeless shelter as Sue said this was something she wanted to do. Upon hearing Sue has left Jango, Mike makes his way to her mothers house where the two declare their love for each other and probably live happily ever after.
As well as the dreary storyline there are a few other odds and ends that are unable to satisfy a viewer. The first is, if you were staying at a motel, got involved with someone, then they came looking for you at your work place, wouldn’t this freak you out? Aniston’s character however takes it all in her stride and allows the man to stay. This is beyond any rational thinking and the type of thing you hear horror stories about in the daily newspapers! The second thing to overcome while watching is the actual lack of comedy. There is nothing funny, a part from Harrelson welding a BB gun, Zahn’s face while skydiving and his attempt at singing. No funny jokes, no comical fallings over and nothing to get you laughing in stitches. It was very disappointing.
These three personalities all have what it takes to make an incredible film, not only bring out the romance (if that is what you are after) but also set the screen alight with humour. The script lacks comedy thereby these three are unable to make any true and honest forms of humour. If you are portraying characters that are tedious, have very dull careers and don’t have the ‘wow’ factor, then any attempts at making a viewer laugh will fail, just as it did here, repeatedly.
Michelle Moore