I feel pretty follows Renee Bennett, (Amy Schumer), who after an accident at Soul Cycle, suddenly believes she is the beautiful person she always wanted to be. The film promotes a strong message about body confidence which is always timely and relevant. Despite this neither the premise nor the message is not original, in any way, having been done many times before. However, where this film iterates on the idea is by having Renee be the only one who can see this beautiful person she thinks she is, with everybody else, only seeing the same Women from the start of the film. My main issue with the film is that it relies on stereotypes about women, which reeks of bad writing. Whatsmore Amy Schumer’s performance has no charm coming across as vain, and just quite annoying. This truly is a detriment as you don’t root for her, but rather against her a lot of the time. Using Renee as the idea of every woman is offensive because; she is not nuanced or layered, but rather two dimensional. The high point of the film is its humour and its heart, with it being affecting especially at the end. The film is saved, however, by its wider supporting cast, whether it is Renee’s friends, Vivian and Jane, (Aidy Bryant and Busy Philipps) or Michelle Williams’ character of Avery LeClaire. Vivian and Jane are most better representations of the idea of the every woman, as they just want to be happy and don’t care what other people think, and unlike Renee, you root for them. Williams’ LeClaire is unlike the other confident people and has a true sense of vulnerability, this comes from her need to please her Grandmother. Through Williams’ performance, we see the most well-rounded character in the film. Conversely, the film also uses a lot of needless characters such as Grant LeClaire, (Tom Hopper), who aren’t really characters, but rather just plot devices. To conclude this isn’t the worst comedy to see, it does try and put forward a nice message, but it is hurt by a bad performance from Schumer and a lack to take more daring creative risks. Go and see it for Williams’ performance alone.
2/5
Reviewed by Luke
Another Millennial Reviewer 