Friendsgiving Blu-ray Review
When Friendsgiving popped up in my email as a potential review title, I sort of scoffed. I’d never heard of it but something about the huge cast made me curious. I popped in the disc and was immediately pleased with my decision to take the film on. Read more about Friendsgiving below and click the paid link at the end to snag yourself a copy, which streets on October 27th!
Film 
Molly (Malin Ackerman) is a Hollywood actress in the midst of a divorce. She has an infant son, Eden and is in the middle of a hot fling with Jeff (Jack Donnelly) whom she feels she can be adventurous with as she navigates the divorce. Abby (Kat Dennings) has just suffered an embarrassing breakup and is still pining for the girlfriend who may not even have loved her in the first place. Her nagging mother and sister continue to push her towards men, though she has stated she is and will always be a lesbian. As Thanksgiving literally falls on top of Abby and Molly, they’re able to lean on each other and be the support they weren’t getting from their former loves.
As the holiday begins, Molly and Abby see a shift in their best friend celebration as Jeff begs to be included and out of nowhere Molly’s mother (Jane Seymour) drops in with a boatload of luggage from Sweden. Abby immediately feels jealous and wants to bail. Molly makes good on the promise of a still smallish get together, but then friends (including Aisha Tyler, Christine Taylor and Andrew Santino and Deon Cole) crash the party making for a full-blown celebration complete with magic mushrooms and a photo booth! Zaniness is on the menu for all in this full-bodied, consistently hilarious comedy.
I sat down with this movie with zero expectations. I was pleasantly surprised by the breezy nature of this brassy comedy. It’s raunchy, totally deserving of the hard R rating, but also has such a sweet core. I truly enjoyed the relationship dynamic between everyone as they bonded over the day and was able to get past some of the more cliché moments in the script. Modern comedies often come with them and sometimes it’s hard to forgive some of those textbook comedy tropes. Dennings and Ackerman deserve a big heap of the praise here, with natural energy between them and a truly funny supporting cast and some great cameos from some “Fairy Gay Mothers” (Fortune Feimster, Wanda Sykes and Margaret Cho) to boot!
I watched the movie through the credits and noticed that this film was made two years ago. It’s hard to believe that anyone would pass on a film like this. It would’ve been a sleeper film two years ago, and now in these crazy times, one can only hope people embrace it at home! Friendsgiving is a pleasant surprise!
Video
- Encoding: MPEG-4 AVC
- Resolution: 1080P
- Aspect Ratio:85:1
- Layers: BD-50
- Clarity/Detail: This is a finely detailed HD transfer. There is no softness to the look of the film. Close ups render much detail and clarity in the foreground and background is excellent too.
- Depth: This is an HD transfer, but there is not a loss of depth to the image. Scenes are given a lot of space, with nice fluid movement from moving shots.
- Black Levels: Blacks look great throughout, with deepness and no crush. There are no instances of grey blacks or loss of definition in the shadows.
- Color Reproduction: Friendsgiving is a film based in a warm colored setting. Browns, blacks, reds, golds and yellows all pop with gorgeous warmth.
- Flesh Tones: Flesh tones look great and natural. Everyone has a warm glow about them, with the many skin tones of the multicultural cast looking great throughout.
- Noise/Artifacts: Clean
Audio
- Audio Format(s): English DTS-HD 5.1
- Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish
- Dynamics: As is typical with a comedy, music and sound effects come with a certain heft, with sound effects and music sometimes being louder than dialogue. Despite this, there isn’t an issue overall with any need to adjust volume or anything. For the most part the mix is quite complimentary to the film, even if at times it’s just a little pedestrian.
- Height: N/A
- Low Frequency Extension: LFE is given it’s work with music. There aren’t many other chances for that bass thump to make an appearance. That being said, the music sounds nice and full with the occasional bass drop from more modern sounding songs.
- Surround Sound Presentation: Surrounds are all about outdoor ambient noise, off screen talking and oddly enough a very “6-channel stereo” sound effect for some of the songs. The music does not sound bad at all, but odd considering not all of the music sounds this way.
- Dialogue Reproduction: Dialogue sounds great for the most part… The only complaint being that there really are moments where the dialogue is quieter than any other sound elements.
Extras 
There are just a couple of extras for Friendsgiving. The film ships with a slipcover and a digital code too. Features are:
- Commentary by Malin Akerman and Nicol Paone (director)
- Gag Reel
- Making Friendsgiving: Serving Up Insanity
The features including the commentary are fairly banal, but it’s to be expected with a release like this.
Summary
If you’re looking to add a new Thanksgiving film to your collection, I’d say this one hits the mark. It’s tone is somewhere between a Planes, Trains and Automobiles and Home For The Holidays. There’s enough raunch to keep it thoroughly modern and some genuine deep belly laugh moments too. Technical merits for the disc are solid and even with a lack of special features this is a no-brainer comedy for fans of the genre!
