A fantastic concept that frays under the rigors of narrative convention, the premise of The Joneses — a pre-fab family unit is hired to infiltrate and market to an affluent suburban neighborhood — sold half of Hollywood, attracting bucks and talent to the table. Yet as pointed out by David Foster Wallace, the man who envisioned entire calendar years being branded (“The Year of the Perdue Wonder Chicken” will never stop making me laugh), the obviousness of the target requires a more expansive execution: “We already ‘know’ U.S. culture is materialistic,” he said. “This diagnosis can be done in about two lines. [The] engaging and artistically real [question is] how is it that we as human beings still have the capacity for joy, charity, genuine connections, for stuff that doesn’t have a price?” First-time writer/director Derrick Borte does make a bleakly viable case for an extreme strain of our materialism, but the film’s attempt at a humanistic antidote diffuses its intriguing chemistry for the worse.
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REVIEW: Can The Joneses Keep Up with Its Own Premise?
