Another Simple Favor (SXSW) Review: Hilarious Moments And Beautiful Scenery Makes This A Worthy Sequel.

I doubt most people thought 2018’s A Simple Favor would ever get a sequel. Well, a $98 million total gross, and eight years later we get Another Simple Favor. Leading up to the premiere screening last Friday at SXSW there were a lot of questions being asked. Could a sequel work? Will everything going on around Its star Blake Lively detract people from watching it? I can wholeheartedly say this film works on so many levels, especially the cast and comedic twists and turns.

The crowd to watch this film last weekend was WILD and in a good way. What made the original work was its dark comedic tones and the enigmatic chemistry between Lively and Kendrick. Being around a crowd that was yelling and laughing throughout made it sad knowing this film would not get a theatrical release. Instead Prime has decided this film will go straight to streaming on May 1, 2025. Either way, there will surely be Another Simple Favor hangouts filled with Rose and charcuterie.

The funny thing here is that no one thought A Simple Favor would get a sequel. No one. Not even director Paul Feig. He wasn’t sure he wanted to make a sequel or if anyone wanted one to the first film. He doubled down on his reservations during a conversation at the Austin Convention Center on Saturday afternoon.

“We worked this script forever,” Feig said. “I tried to kill that project many times. It was terrifying.” “We threw out a whole script that was greenlit,” he explained. “I was reading the response from people who were so excited for a sequel, and I thought, ‘This is not what they want.’ So, we got together with the writers and threw out that 70 percent of what we had and then made it into what it is — only because Laura (Laura Fischer) just kept saying ‘We have to do this.’ I didn’t want to fuck it up. So, I’m really happy about how it came out”.

A Simple Favor started out calmly, and then slowly built up the chaos over the course of the film. This sequel, on the other hand, tosses you right into the chaos from the get-go, with Emily (Lively) crashing one of Stephanie’s (Kendrick) book signings specifically to do just that, and the chaos only gets more and more intense from there.

While not as inspired as the original and more of a retread than expected, the gorgeous scenery (well-photographed by John Schwartzman) and an especially fantastic turn by Lively make it worthwhile. Emily Nelson is easily the best role of her career (sorry GG fans), with her getting more screen time than she did in the original, thanks to an added twist (which I won’t reveal here). While Lively looks terrific in her jaw-dropping wardrobe, she sinks her teeth into the camp aspect of the role, playing well off Kendrick, whose Stephanie is portrayed as a little less naive in this installment.  

There’s mob drama that barely accounts for 10 percent of the wackiness in “Another Simple Favor,” which also features its fair share of family sabotage, secret identities, assassinations, corrupt cops, and myriad other twists that will remain unspoiled. Describing the plot as utter nonsense would both be a million percent correct and likely taken as a massive compliment for all involved. A swing for the fences that are unconstrained by any form of reality is a refreshing thing to watch, even if its existence feels like little more than an excuse for Feig and the cast to hang out in Capri.

If there was something for me to nitpick then it would have to be all the endings. There were enough endings to fill an episode of Dateline. But the gorgeous Sorrentine Peninsula, hilarious moments, and electric chemistry make this film such a delight that you’ll want to watch the film again and again. Could we get an Another ANOTHER Simple Favor? I hope so.

For more Reviews, make sure to check back to That Hashtag Show.

Keep Reading:

Novocaine – Not Your Average 2020’s Action Movie [Review]