Have you ever been scrolling though Netflix and see something that makes you go “Hmm, I wonder if that’s any good,” but then you just end up rewatching The Office for the fifteenth time? Well that’s what I’m here for. Not the part about The Office, but to tell you if things on Netflix are actually worth your time. Up first we have a movie called The Package, although it is sometimes stylized as just an eggplant emoji. The Package is a movie about a group of teenagers who decide that they are going to hike deep into the woods and get insanely drunk in order to celebrate spring break.
All is well until one of these teenagers suffers an accident that costs him his penis. The rest of the movie follows the remaining friends as they rush to get the penis back to its rightful owner.
So right off the bat I’m sure you can tell that The Package isn’t going to win any awards, nor do I think it tried to. The movie is terribly low-brow. You can’t write a movie featuring a severed penis and not have it filled to the brim with toilet humour of the lowest caliber.
Now I’m no snob when it comes to comedy, but there is a limit. After about the twentieth dick joke I start to wonder if life has anything more to offer. In the case of The Package, it did not.
Overall, The Package exists in kind of a weird place. It tries to be a raunchy teen comedy but gets preoccupied with grotesque jokes that just make you uncomfortable.
But the low-brow comedy doesn’t stop with innuendos, because The Package utilizes every opportunity to try and gross out the audience by having the characters do various things with the severed member.
I was going to list a few of the actions that are portrayed in the movie, but I realized that as soon as I do that I’m no better than the group of twelve year-olds that apparently ran the writers room.
Now it isn’t all bad, I have to admit. The Package does have a few moments that got a laugh out of me. Well, it was more like a chuckle, and I could count all of those moments on one hand, but the point still stands. The highlight of this movie in my opinion is the acting. In spite of a script that is just terrible, the actors featured in The Package actually have some pretty impressive talent in terms of comedy.
Whenever The Package would illicit a chuckle from me it would never be because of the joke itself, but because of the delivery. It was almost like these actors knew how dumb this movie was, and instead of trying to play it straight they had some fun with it, and this really shines through in the final product.
But unfortunately this isn’t enough to save the film. The Package has its story completely set up in the first 25 minutes, and then it has seemingly its entire story finished at the 45 minute mark; this is half-way through the movie.
Already it felt like I had been watching The Package for at least 90 minutes, so imagine my surprise when what I thought was the resolution of the film was yet another complication. The Package just doesn’t know when to stop. It always tries to squeeze one more joke or comedic scenario out of this already tired story, and frankly it’s exhausting.
Overall, The Package exists in kind of a weird place. It tries to be a raunchy teen comedy but gets preoccupied with grotesque jokes that just make you uncomfortable.
When the comedy is taken out of the equation of this movie you are left with absolutely nothing but a desire for it to end quickly. But honestly that desire is there even with the comedy.
So is The Package worth watching? No. Just stick with The Office for now.