‘Trainwreck’ was the perfect introduction to Amy Schumer’s talents, striding the line between saucy, sweet and spill-your-popcorn funny. But with her second major film role, Schumer needed to show her range – can she play anything other than a directionless, oversexed thirtysomething who drinks too much but learns a few valuable life lessons before the credits roll? On this evidence, um, no.
Schumer is Emily, a directionless, oversexed thirtysomething whose dream holiday to Ecuador goes off the rails when her boyfriend dumps her and she’s forced to invite her scaredy-cat mum Linda (Goldie Hawn) along instead. Linda is convinced the pair of them are going to be kidnapped and sold for ransom by drug lords – which is, of course, exactly what happens.
What follows is a series of aimless, goofy hijinks, as the pair hamfistedly escape only to bicker their way across the Amazon jungle. A few of the gags hit home – Schumer’s flawless timing makes the best of some creaky one-liners. Her blend of glee and horror when she inadvertently murders one of their captors hints at the sharper, more interesting film that might’ve been. But too much of the humour derives from Emily’s insatiable appetite for booze, food and sex, while the central mother-daughter relationship is predictable. Goldie Hawn broke a self-imposed 15-year retirement for this – she must be missing her armchair now.