Whether it’s a high school reunion, wedding or annual gathering, a friend group coming together can often lead to some meaningful reflections on life as much as hilarious interactions among everyone, whether it’s taking to the road with the ensemble cast of Wild Hogs or carrying on a childhood tradition in the 2018 hit Tag. Now, writer-director Deena Kashper has brought her own take to the genre with the potentially apocalyptic Nuked. It may not be the most original, but it still proves to be a funny enough endeavor.
Based on a story by Deena and her partner, Danny Kashper, Nuked primarily centers on Jack and Gill, a married couple who have been together for 20 years, who invite a group of friends to their isolated mansion to celebrate their 40th birthdays. However, what is initially meant to be a night full of cannabis-infused cuisine and lighthearted reflection turns into one of fear and life-changing decisions when they all get notifications that a ballistic missile is heading their way.
Nuked’s Story Is Familiar, But Is Still Nicely Paced
I Just Wish It Took A Little More Risks
When we meet our characters in Nuked, we meet a nice mixture of familiar and fresh personality types to round out the ensemble. Justin Bartha’s Jack is a husband longing to regain his wife’s attention and start a family; Anna Camp’s Gill is his wife addicted to her newfound viral success; Lucy Punch’s Penelope is a mother to a newborn who has made raising them her whole life; George Young’s Sam is her husband who is seemingly tired of his domestic life.
Ignacio Serricchio’s Logan, meanwhile, is a former rockstar longing for the better days and Tawny Newsome’s Mo is a politician’s ᴀssistant whose past with Logan is still affecting her. Maulik Pancholy’s Ishaan and Stephen Guarino’s Damian are, for most of the film, the intriguing standouts of the ensemble, generally being the least dysfunctional as their partnership appears to be on a strong foundation following the former’s recovery from cancer.
One of the biggest areas where I feel like the movie could have performed better was in its ending and the progression of its nuclear threat.
While the start of the party features allusions to the dysfunction in the various couples’ lives, Kashper nicely subverts expectations of how the tension escalates among the Nuked cast once they all turn to huddling in the basement for safety. The writing skips the pᴀssive-aggressive conversations and goes right for the jugular, with the group calling out each other’s flaws, a believable pace given the apocalypse is seemingly approaching, and the group is left pondering missed opportunities in life.
Some of the domestic squabbling that comes from this is fairly familiar, namely, longtime spouses realizing they have different goals for their marriage and former lovers having their prior pᴀssions rekindled. Similarly, the way some of them progress and play out is rushed in parts, even for a movie that spends the majority of its 86-minute runtime focused on said development.
One of the biggest areas where I feel like the movie could have performed better was in its ending and the progression of its nuclear threat. Without getting into spoilers, I did spend a fair amount of the film wondering whether Kashper would be bold enough to pull the trigger on the missile supposedly heading for the group’s area, or if it would all be a false alarm, and they would find themselves having confronted all of these uncertainties for no apparent reason. There were enough rug pulls that kept me guessing, but I was still a bit underwhelmed by the movie’s wider stakes.
Kashper’s Script Is Sharp & Funny
I Was Both Invested & Laughing At The Characters’ Dynamics
Despite my issues with the movie’s fairly familiar story, Nuked generally overcomes this in its writing, which provides plenty of laughs and biting commentary on modern life to maintain emotional investment in the material. Gill’s addiction to social media and her newfound stardom continue to feel all too real in today’s world, but is still played with enough sincerity on the part of Camp’s performance and Kashper’s script that I found myself compelled to see how it would play out.
One element of the film that had me laughing the most was that of Ishaan and Damian’s dynamic, both with each other and with how their relationship pours over to the rest of the friend group. The hints of discord between them over Damian’s consensual extramarital affairs lead to some fun barbs at each other’s expense. Watching Ishaan’s paranoia kick in and turning to Penelope for support, and Damian and Gill having further fun once the weed sets in, is also plenty enjoyable.
Nuked’s Cast All Play Their Roles To Perfection
George Young, In Particular, Is A Welcome Comedy Player
Nuked‘s cast does a fantastic job with their roles, proving they were the perfect people for their parts. While I’ve always found Bartha to be an underrated performer since the likes of the National Treasure movies and the unfairly overlooked comedy The New Normal, I have to give George Young a lot of credit for bringing the laughs to his role.
The English actor was immediately put on my radar thanks to James Wan’s Malignant, but he shines in the world of comedy. Hopefully, the group will find a way to come back together for another story in the future, as their chemistry was truly off the charts.
Nuked hits theaters, digital platforms, and VOD on July 11.
