And the award nominees just keep coming! I've seriously been underutilizing my streaming services and I'm trying to do better. There's just so much content. This has been sitting in my Netflix queue since the last Oscars and it turns out it's been available on Amazon Prime the whole time. Not that you should necessarily rush out to watch it. It's not great.Kumail Nanjani (himself) is trying to make it as a stand-up comedian in Chicago when he meets Emily (Zoe Kazan), a graduate student. They hit it off and begin dating but their relationship implodes when she discovers Kumail has been lying to his family, staunchly traditional Pakistanis who want him to have an arranged marriage, about seeing her. They break up. Then Kumail gets a phone call from one of Emily's friends and must make a decision to put her in a medically-induced coma to treat a very aggressive infection. Kumail feels a complicated mix of emotions that are only compounded by the arrival of Emily's parents (Holly Hunter and Ray Romano) from North Carolina.
This gets points for being based on a true story. Nanjani and his wife, Emily V. Gordon, wrote the screenplay together, which is what it got nominated for. And it is an incredible story. Unfortunately, Kazan and Nanjani have no chemistry so it's really hard to see why he'd stick around through a coma. Not that he's much of a prize anyway. The bits at the comedy club are funny in a low-key way but there are no laugh-out-loud moments ever in the film.
I do want to highlight Adeel Akhtar as Kumail's brother, Naveed. He was an absolute scene-stealer and I would have loved it if the movie had been about him instead.
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