Movie Review: Joy Ride

 

Clearly positioning itself as a pure summer hangout buddy comedy with a prime post-July 4th release date, Joy Ride does its job well. The directorial debut from veteran screenwriter/producer Adele Lim (Crazy Rich Asians, Raya and the Last Dragon) tells the story of Seattle-area lawyer Audrey Sullivan (Ashley Park) who travels to China with her lifelong best friend Lolo (Sherry Cola) and Lolo's socially awkward cousin who goes by the name Deadeye (Sabrina Wu) as she attempts to secure a major client (Ronny Chieng) for her firm-which if successful, would land her a promotion to partner. After the initial meeting with her client goes sideways in a hurry, Lolo, Deadeye and her college roommate (Stephanie Hsu)-who is now a Chinese soap opera star-convince Audrey-who was adopted by an American couple (David Denman, Annie Mumolo) as a child-to seek out her birth mother in China to help close the prospective deal as the client is a family-driven person. 

This "4 friends journeying across China" narrative provides many opportunities for comedic situations to arise and often times for the screenwriting duo of Cherry Chevapravatdumrong (Family Guy, The Orville) and Teresa Hsiao (Family Guy, Awakafina is Nora From Queens), that means going straight to the gutter. Joy Ride is as brazenly fearless in it its delivery of gross-out/sexual humor as any movie the genre has produced in recent years and all of the leads along with the revolving door of supporting players (Chieng, Meredith Hagner, Chris Pang, Alexander Hodge, Lori Tann Chinn, a retired 2x NBA All-Star playing himself whose appearance got a huge reaction out of me and me alone at my screening) that show up during their trip that roll with the punches without even thinking twice. There's a sense that everyone involved-particularly the Asian cast members-figured this could be their only shot to do something like this and just committed to being unapologetically vulgar and having a great time doing it. When you belong to a racial group that is often categorized as the meek, submissive "model minority", I'd imagine getting the chance to show you're capable of being just as wild and obscene as anybody else has to be liberating and cathartic .   

When Joy Ride steps away from the buzzy highs of its crude comedy and the warm friendship dynamic between Park, Cola, Hsu and Wu, it runs into a bit of trouble. It's a bit too reliant on its bigger, grosser bits to produce laughs as the other scenes rarely hit the highs of those moments (the lone exception is a scene where Deadeye is playing a card game with a kid where Wu solidifies their standing as the movie's MVP) and while Audrey eventually gets a nice sense of closure, the dramatic conflict is too abruptly introduced and resolved to have the intended heartstring-tugging effect. Despite its comedic and narrative hiccups, Joy Ride is still plenty funny, breezy and pleasant enough to keep the summer 2023 R-rated comedy batting average at a pristine 1.000. 

Grade: B