Set It Up
I think I was 8-years-old when I watched While You Were Sleeping for the first time with my mom. There was something about seeing 1995 New York scroll across the screen while Natalie Cole sang. Watching a fantastical story about two people meeting and then falling in love gives me a feeling that few genres can replicate. There’s a nostalgic bliss that washes over me whenever it starts and somehow, I’ve know it was special since I was a kid. It’s the same feeling I get when watch other classics like You’ve Got Mail or The Preacher’s Wife.
There are a lot of romantic comedies out there but not all of them can wrap you in a blanket of feelings and take you on a journey that you’ll care about. That’s why it was so surprising that Netflix was able to release what may be the next rom com classic. Netflix doesn’t have the best track record for original films and 2018 has given us a few stinkers. But in Set It Up, Netflix has found something that it needs to hold onto forever.
We follow Harper (Zoey Deutch) and Charlie (Glen Powell) as they navigate the thankless job of being assistants in New York. Harper works for demanding sports journalist Kristen Stevens (Lucy Liu) and hopes to follow in her footsteps. Charlie works for temperamental venture capitalist Rick (Taye Diggs) and hopes to make enough money to support his supermodel girlfriend Suze (Joan Smalls). After the standard meet cute between our star characters, they hatch a Parent Trap-esque plan to get their bosses together so that they can get a much-needed break from work. The plan works a little too well and after trapping them in an elevator and paying Yankee Stadium workers to put them on the kiss cam, Rick and Kristen decide to get married.
With everything clicking and the friendship building between Charlie and Harper, it takes the film a little while to get rolling into its second half where their seemingly perfect plan falls apart and the real romance begins. While the way that Rick and Kristen’s “relationship” dissipates leaves a weird taste in my mouth, it does set up a big speech at the airport moment that Glen Powell delivers emphatically, though its a little too cheerful for my taste. As both Charlie and Harper realize what they want and what will truly make them happy, the film wraps itself up with a heartwarming bow with the light backing music you’d find in any middling comedy from the early 2000's.
The film takes a lot of cues (and plot devices) from its predecessors and is able to make itself feel familiar without sacrificing its attempt to make something new. Zoey Deutch and Glen Powell both ooze charm and their chemistry on screen helps to elevates the romance between their characters. The laughs here aren’t forced and even the moments we spend watching Taye Diggs destroy his office never feel over the top or out of place. But it isn’t perfect and side characters like Charlie’s roommate Duncan (Pete Davidson) somehow feel both necessary to the rom com formula and a little too underdeveloped to work how they are intended to. The will-they-won’t-they nature of the film also drags out a little longer than needed and Charlie and Harper don’t show that they may have feelings for each other until over an hour into the film. The saving grace to that being how effective it is once those feelings are expressed through longing looks over early morning pizza.
Set It Up feels warm amongst other Netflix film offerings that don’t allow you to connect as closely to its main characters. Director Claire Scanlon and screenwriter Katie Silberman don’t take a lot of risks and when you separate all of its parts it threatens to be a little bland but the final product is anything but. This is another great entry in a long line of rom coms that I will happily watch over and over again until I know every word and then I’ll watch it again just to make sure that I got it.
I give it 3 ½ out of 5 trash cans.
