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Apr 30, 2015 By Stephen Danay Issue #53 - April/May 2015 - Tame Impala

Alice Klieg, a daytime talk show-obsessed shut-in with borderline personality disorder, finds her carefully regimented life interrupted when she wins $86 million in the California state lottery. Ignoring the advice of her long-suffering loved ones, Alice takes the money to a failing local network and precedes to launch her own daytime talk show, Welcome to Me, in which she works out her myriad issues and grievances in front of a captivated nation.

Comedies starring the mentally ill are generally not a good idea. And while Welcome to Me and its star Kristen Wiig treat Alice with a great deal of sympathy, the film’s attempts to force her suffering into the standard indie dramedy template leaves it feeling disappointingly trite when it could have been much more disturbing. This is not to say the film is not occasionally very funny: Wiig is effortlessly charming as always, despite playing a deeply disturbed narcissist. Or, not occasionally very disturbing: by the time her show inevitably falls apart, there will certainly be a few shocked silences in the audience. While it’s admirable that the film rises above cheap, lazy jabs at a serious psychological condition, it’s unfortunate that it could not trust the charisma of its cast to provide the levity while fully committing to the dark, disturbing nature of its premise.

www.welcometomemovie.com

Author rating: 5.5/10