Funny, lightweight comedy about three male buddies who, once they realize they all have deep hatred for their respective bosses, conspire to kill them. Without giving anything away, the comedy is not as dependent on the darkness of the premise as much as it leans on the comic talents of its cast, specifically its three leads, Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, and Jason Sudeikis. As the three beleaguered members of today’s workforce (working in a business, Dentist’s, and auto parts office, respectively), the trio has the two key factors for making this kind of movie work: a likable, shlubby sense of affability and charm, and a revelatory, Hangover 1-level of chemistry. Various scenes of the three comic performers riffing over each other (both in the film and in the outtakes) exemplify just how crucial the interactions between the three 30ish white males is to the overall impact of the film. Coming in a close second is the presence of major A-listers in the supporting roles: as the bosses, Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston, and Colin Farrell 
leave lasting impressions as various incarnations of “the boss from hell” (I would not dare reveal a late cameo as a 4th category of evil boss). While Aniston seems to be getting by too easily on merely raunching it up (as it appears Cameron Diaz recently did in Bad Teacher), Spacey is a menacing presence as what is, essentially, a dry reinterpretation of his Buddy Ackerman character, and Farrell is nearly unrecognizable (in the best way possible) as the coke-sniffing, kung-fu obsessed, spoiled-bitch heir to his father’s auto parts throne. I would’ve liked more of Farrell and less of Aniston (part of me suspects his shtick was a little too out-there and intense for most test audiences), but all three suit themselves well to this material, and are all obviously having a blast on the other side of their usual steadfast-protagonist roles. And special mention must go to Jamie Foxx who, in his three-scene role as the sketchy “Motherfucker” Jones, reminded me of how goddam funny he was before he started taking serious roles almost exclusively. The talents of the cast cover up the fact that the film is not, in the end, the subversive, black comedy it was made out to be, but rather a hilariously performed, staged, and executed meditation on the angst of finding stability in today’s warzone of a job market (complete with a post-Lehman Brothers Yale grad giving handies for 20 bucks a pop).
Recommended for fans of the cast or of the high-concept premise. This is really not a hard sell; in a summer of misadvertised comedies (the Hangover sequel that was merely a carbon copy, the Bridesmaids-centric comedy that turned out to be a mid-life crisis dramedy), the worst crime of this one’s marketing is using the bleakness of its premise to get you into the theater, rather than to get you to squirm in your seat in between the regularly induced fits of laughter.
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