‘Another Simple Favor’ review: Anna Kendrick and Blake Lively return for uninspired sequel

Dir: Paul Feig. US. 2025. 120mins 

Anna Kendrick’s timid single mom and Blake Energetic’s daring schemer reunite in One other Easy Favor, a twistier and much much less entertaining sequel. Seven years after A Easy Favor, these frenemies head off to Capri for a glitzy wedding ceremony, which will get interrupted by random murders and wild double-crosses. Director Paul Feig brings the identical sly method to this lavish follow-up, however the outcomes really feel much more strained than the unique, which was usually extra trendy than deliciously diabolical. 

The unique’s convoluted plotting proves much more disjointed this time round

The movie opens this 12 months’s SXSW, the competition that launched two of Feig’s largest hits, Bridesmaids ($325m worldwide) and Spy ($236m). A Easy Favor, which was based mostly on Darcey Bell’s 2017 novel, grossed a formidable $98m on a modest funds, however this bloodier second chapter will likely be launched completely on Prime Video on Could 1. Kendrick and Energetic’s star energy ought to as soon as once more be a draw, and common viewers of The White Lotus must also join with a narrative of fabulously wealthy individuals in stunning locales who’ve a nasty behavior of winding up lifeless.

Stephanie (Kendrick) is now a profitable creator who has written a nonfiction guide in regards to the incidents dramatised in A Easy Favor: how she grew to become obsessive about glamorous fellow mom Emily (Energetic), who turned out to be concocting a rip-off to extricate herself from ineffectual husband Sean (Henry Golding). That movie ended with Emily being despatched to jail, so Stephanie is shocked to study that Emily is now free — her legal professionals bought her out early — and has invited Stephanie to her wedding ceremony in Capri. Nonetheless a single working mom, Stephanie desires nothing to do with this legal, however Emily insists she be her maid of honour — or she is going to sue Stephanie for utilizing her identify and likeness in her guide with out permission.

That flimsy rationale to get Stephanie and Emily again collectively highlights the nagging plot issues that litter One other Easy Favor. Cautious of Emily’s ulterior motives, Stephanie nonetheless flies to the beautiful Italian island, the place she meets Emily’s hunky, rich fiance Dante (Michele Morrone), a member of considered one of Capri’s feuding mob households. Stephanie additionally encounters Sean, now a disillusioned drunk, and Emily’s mentally scattered older mom Margaret (Elizabeth Perkins, changing Jean Sensible from the unique movie). Earlier than the nuptials can happen, nevertheless, a stunning loss of life happens — the native police dismiss it as an accident, however Stephanie suspects foul play and is set to seek out the killer.

A Easy Favor examined the pressures of motherhood, the complexity of feminine friendships and the banality of smalltown life, all of the whereas costuming its two leads within the sharpest, most elegant outfits possible. (Costume designer Renee Ehrlich Kalfus returns for this new instalment, as soon as once more delivering one knockout ensemble after one other.) However the unique movie’s superficial remedy of its themes was not less than bolstered by the shifting energy dynamics between nerdy Stephanie and worldly Emily, who handled her insecure new pal nearly like a pet — till Stephanie grew to become conscious of how she was being manipulated as a part of Emily’s elaborate con. 

Maybe inevitably, One other Easy Favor loses that component of shock. Everybody within the viewers, in addition to Stephanie, is aware of to not belief Emily, which makes Stephanie’s determination to attend the marriage nonsensical — clearly, it’s merely an excuse to justify the brand new movie’s existence and the twists to return. Within the course of, the unique movie’s observations about how ladies should battle to have an identification outdoors of being a mom will get pushed apart for a labyrinthine whodunit involving two murders and quite a few suspects.

Kendrick does have a number of adorkable moments — Stephanie is funniest when she is in over her head coping with imposing gangsters or dopey FBI brokers — however the screenplay by Jessica Sharzer and Laeta Kalogridis focuses on purple herrings over character, leading to an empty homicide thriller that too usually retains Stephanie and Emily lower off from each other. (Energetic principally rehashes Emily’s flirty condescension, robbing this grasp scammer of her spark.) Of the sequel’s new solid members, Allison Janney makes the most important affect as Emily’s long-lost Aunt Linda, who could also be hatching her personal nefarious plot. 

The primary movie led with its luxurious aesthetic selections, accented by John Schwartzman’s slick lensing and a fleet of classic French pop songs on the soundtrack. Feig has recruited a number of of his A Easy Favor collaborators, together with Schwartzman, for this extra picturesque crime comedy with its sun-splashed locales and impossibly blue waters. (It shot at Rome’s Cinecitta.) However the unique’s convoluted plotting proves much more disjointed this time round, the drab nods to bygone Hollywood gems like North By Northwest merely underlining what’s so uninspired right here. Stephanie will come to remorse letting Emily again into her life — viewers could really feel the same regret about revisiting these characters.