By: Jolie Featherstone

Unplugging is a good-natured movie about a married couple trying to divorce themselves from their electronic devices during a country holiday getaway.

Jeanine (Eva Longoria) is a busy working mom and wife.  She’s perpetually glued to her phone.  She can’t even bathe without bringing her phone into the shower.  On the flip side, her husband, Dan (Matt Walsh), was previously a busy ad man but now works from home on his artisanal sauce business.  He fills the gaps in his day with video games and YouTube videos.  When a friend of Dan’s suddenly passes away, Dan experiences an existential crisis.  Looking at their digital-dependent lives and near-constant distraction from one another, Dan convinces Jeanine to disconnect from their devices and reconnect IRL over the course of a weekend away.  What starts off as an idyllic, quaint getaway in a remote mountain town quickly goes awry.

Unplugging is a big-hearted rom-com featuring delightful performances and cameos, including Lea Thompson, Keith David, and Nicole Byers as quirky characters the couple encounter on their madcap vacation.  The film marks director Debra Neil-Fisher’s feature film directorial debut.  Neil-Fisher leads the film with a skilled, steady hand.  Although this is her directorial debut, Neil-Fisher is a seasoned editor with a filmography chock-full of blockbusters (How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days, Fifty Shades of Grey, Coming 2 America, Transformers: The Last Knight), family dramas (Fried Green Tomatoes) and comedies (Austin Powers 1 & 2, The Hangover franchise).  Neil-Fisher’s experience as an editor could atttribute to Unplugging‘s slick production value, and its well-timed comedy.

In terms of narrative structure, there is one scene in the film wherein a secret is revealed in a tense moment between the couple.  This revelation is quite profound in the moment, yet it is quickly forgotten as the misadventure proceeds.  It felt as if it was a conflict in the writing (Matt Walsh co-wrote the script with TV writer Brad Morris).  Convention would tell us that some big confession or outpouring would need to happen at that moment.  And, eventually, there would be some resolution to that outpouring.  In this case, it feels as if the confession is shoved aside as the couple continues on their misadventure and yet it doesn’t get fully brought up again, despite it hinting at a substantial source of fear for both parties.  To fully round out the tension, the film would have benefitted from spending a little more time on that point.

Unplugging speaks to a common reality for many North Americans who rely on digital stimuli and have a hard time disconnecting from devices for any number of reasons.  The film doesn’t take itself too seriously which gives it a pleasant buoyancy.  It’s a sweet love story/adventure/social comedy that makes for a fun and fresh choice for movie night.

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Jolie Featherstone: @TOFilmFiles