The Big Sick

Directed By: Michael ShowalterWritten By: Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani Starring: Kumail Nanjiani, Zoe Kazan, Holly Hunter, Ray Romano, Anupam Kher

The Big Sick, without

conjecture, is a critical juggernaut. Acquiring its first batch of lovers at the Sundance Film Festival in January, Judd Apatow’s (producer of the film) latest has snaffled imaginations with its accessible, luminous personality, and has since only grown in stature. After Sundance there was South by South West where awards followed, then a limited release, and now the film is viewable in cinemas broadly, where the adoration persists.

It’s not hard to see why The Big Sick has registered like it has. It’s a film endeavouring to march to the beat of its own drum whilst pinpointing that ever-palatable tone of muted sentimentality that has characterised so many of Apatow’s movies. Apatow himself didn’t write or direct the film, but his presence is spectral and his fingerprints are abundant. Michael Showalter directed it, an alumnus of Wet Hot American Summer and director of Hello, My Name is Doris. Kumail Nanjiani wrote the film with his wife Emily V. Gordon (Nanjiani also stars in the central role), and in mining their own remarkable time together (the story of the real-life couple is turbulent to a degree that would leave veracity for dead if we didn’t know it was so) the duo promise great honesty and subversion of the traditional romcom— promise being the operative word. Watching The Big Sick I couldn’t help but feel somewhat removed from it, that what I was seeing was oddly pedestrian, in spite of the real life weight of its story and its apparent comic boldness. The Big Sick follows through on too few of its promises, rendering it more admirable than likeable.

To begin with that admiration, Nanjiani and Gordon aren’t afraid to veer into corners darker and more dramatic than is custom for this brand of film. It starts out rudimentary enough. Nanjiani plays himself, a Pakistani immigrant and aspiring comic who flounders in modest clubs in the hope of landing a better gig. During one routine he is heckled by North Carolinian Emily (Zoe Kazan, standing in for the real Emily V. Gordon). Tongue firmly planted in cheek, Kumail confronts Emily at a bar afterwards. They each find the other a worthy match of wit, and a whirlwind romance ensues.

Soon Kumail has Emily watching schlocky B movies in bed before moonlighting as her Uber driver, and Emily makes lousy attempts to inform Kumail that she isn’t looking for a boyfriend, a notion she delivers so pathetically that it only highlights their blossoming affections.

The caveat to all this is the Muslim tradition to which Kumail’s family is bound. In a series of episodes which splice Kumail and Emily’s romance, Kumail will eat dinner with his family, lie about praying, will have his mother urge him towards a more noble career in law, before he must then withstand a surprise drop-in by a nice Pakistani girl who just happens to be “passing by”, prospective wives for Kumail as his mother looks to forward an arranged marriage. Kumail humours his mother, he knows if she were to learn of his interracial relationship he would be ostracised, but his eye remains firmly fixed on Emily. In this respect, The Big Sick often resembles The Fiddler on the Roof, dealing so centrally as it does with a parent’s struggle to instil in their child a devotion to their culture.

What darkens the narrative is the illness which soon sweeps over Emily. It’s not a spoiler to say that Emily is hospitalised, Kumail himself has detailed this in the film’s press, it is however a shoulder in the road that betrays convention. Emily is removed from the film for an extended period of time, her presence, like Apatow’s, becoming more spectral. The development also allows Kumail to tender to some ruptures that had appeared in the relationship, as well as landing him in the uncomfortable company of Emily’s parents, played by Ray Romano and Holly Hunter, a dorky Math professor and a rough-edged Southerner with a chip on her shoulder, respectively. Romano and Hunter grow to become the film’s strongest elements, stripping away their initially distant demeanours to reveal their own hidden scars and complexities, all whilst boosting the comedy’s quotient of cringe.

More admirable still is the density of The Big Sick’s thematic catalogue. There are many questions raised, all of them addressed thoughtfully— the issue of stereotyping, the difficulties in reconciling distinct cultures, questions regarding the pursuit of career, questions of love, both romantic and familial. That The Big Sick manages to maintain a clean trajectory whilst engaging each of these ideas may be its greatest success.

And yet…

The final product is never as engaging as it ought to be. For all its straying from the beaten path and ambition, if one peels back the skin of the story they find familiar mechanics at work. The Big Sick remains tethered to the dusty romantic comedy playbook, ticking all the required boxes: Boy and girl meet cute and fall in love, head over heels romance ensues, the obligatory argument scene, the rift that follows, the moment of clarity in the protagonist it inspires, emotional growth, etc. The consigning to convention is peculiar seeming as the story on paper appears to have its own rhythms; peculiar more so when one considers director Showalter once penned a ruthless parody of said conventions in They Came Together—if anyone is to be wary of them, it should be he. The Big Sick originates in the real world, yet in practice it’s all very “Hollywood”.

So much of the film’s praise has been aimed at its apparent perceptiveness and naturalism, at its truthful manner of communication. I found that the language of this naturalism felt ironically affected, as if the film were consciously trying to evoke spontaneity and in doing so calls attention to its intent. And then there is the comedy itself. There are flashes of hilarity, a scene in a hospital cafeteria where Romano feels obliged to raise September 11 with the Muslim Kunail pinpoints particular foot-in-mouth appeal, with Kumail’s ill-advised response serving as the perfect punctuation. But these moments are too few and far between. Nanjiani and Gordon’s screenplay makes a concerted effort to evade farce and physicality in its humour, to keep the text as grounded and humanist as possible. The upshot of this earthy approach is the comedy being located entirely within everyday interactions, dependant on the natural comic allure of its performers, which sadly Mr. Nanjiani as the lead is unable to support. Likeable undoubtedly, with glimpses of a Gervais like penchant for a strategically misplaced quip, Nanjiani ultimately lacks the comedic intuition his material demands.

So it goes for the film entire, ostensibly likeable, but ill-equipped to forge anything truly notable. The appeal is visible, and elsewhere has been felt by audiences, but just like a doomed Apatowian romance, I found myself more in love with the idea of the subject than the subject itself.

Rating:

2.25/4