“A Simple Favor” started off hot Friday, earning $5.92 million in the box office, according to Forbes. Blake Lively shifted from her normal type of “heroine” roles to the mysterious, sociopathic character she plays in “A Simple Favor.” This movie, adapted from the Darcey Bell novel, is a darker version of “Gone Girl,” with humor added in.
Lively has been preparing for this role by transitioning into the type of style her character, Emily, dons in this movie. Months before the movie, Lively Instagrammed herself wearing these gorgeous, chic suits everywhere. Both co-star Anna Kendrick and Lively have been heavily promoting this movie on their individual Instagrams.
The movie starts off with us seeing the vast contrast between the two main characters. Kendrick plays Stephanie, who is a stay-at-home mommy blogger with a dark secret. While Lively plays Emily, who is a successful public relations executive and has numerous dark secrets of her own. These two unlikely friends form a bond after both of their sons request to have playdates together, during which they learn about each other’s twisted pasts. After they form this friendship, Emily asks Stephanie for a simple favor: to pick up her son from school. Then Emily vanishes without any reason why. This leads Stephanie to start investigating into her new friend’s past to try to find out what happened to her.
A lot of martinis and even more promotions are sprinkled throughout the movie. Aviation Gin is proudly placed in this movie whenever Emily makes one of her classic martinis. Lively fans may notice that Aviation Gin is the alcohol that her husband, Ryan Reynolds, is an ambassador for, and which she’s been working overtime to promote. The martinis play a significant role in two revealing scenes where Emily and Stephanie’s dark secrets about their troubled past are discovered.
These strong female leads turned this movie into an incredible dark mystery. The most important lesson Emily teaches Stephanie throughout the movie is to stop apologizing. As Emily says in the movie, “Never say sorry — it’s a fucked up female habit,” which is a great, inspiring lesson. Stephanie, trying not to apologize throughout the movie, transitions from her quiet, widowed life into a pretty badass character.
If you loved the movie “Gone Girl,” then you will enjoy this movie. The criticism this movie has received is mainly about it being too long, which I agree with. This movie is just shy of two hours and drags on a bit in the middle, but this is mainly because we learn so much about the plot so early on. I would definitely recommend this movie for people to see in theaters. The humor perfectly contrasts the dark secrets that we learn throughout the movie. “A Simple Favor” shows how versatile Kendrick and Lively can be and how well they work together as polar opposite characters.
