Vacation Friends

Directed by Clay Tarver, Vacation Friends follows straight-laced couple Marcus (Lil Rel Howery) and Emily (Yvonne Orji) as they’re caught up in larger-than-life shenanigans after meeting John Cena’s Ron and Meredith Hagner’s Kyla on holiday. It’s agreeably broad subject matter that’s employed to watchable yet forgettable effect by Tarver, as the filmmaker, armed with a screenplay written alongside Tom Mullen, Tim Mullen, Jonathan M. Goldstein, and John Francis Daley, delivers an oddly subdued effort that contains exceedingly (and distressingly) little in the way of legitimate, laugh-out-loud bits of hilarity – which is odd, to say the least, given that the premise, as well as the unapologetically broad efforts of both Cena and Hagner, would seem to lend itself naturally to memorable comedic set-pieces. There’s little doubt, then, that Vacation Friends‘ decent-enough atmosphere is perpuated by its easy-going storyline, agreeable performances, and smattering of funny jokes and asides (eg Kyla attempts to prove that a room is soundproof), and while the whole thing never entirely adds up to much, it’s clear that one could certainly do a whole lot worse in terms of a contemporary, post-Apatow comedy.

**1/2 out of ****