Bad Shabbos

An unfunny feature-length sitcom dressed in quirky Sundance clothing, Daniel Robbins’ absurdist comedy aims for something like Home for the Holidays or August: Osage County crossed with Shiva Baby or Between the Temples. However, the film's tonal incompetence renders little more than an unpleasant sit. There's a dead body at the center of this comedy, which essentially means it's a farce. Yet to be a farce, a film needs pacing and stakes that build and build, not the same jokes played over and over to greatly diminished effect, and a narrative that lurches forward then grinds to a halt in awkward fits and starts. There are so few laughs in this picture that the situations feel cruel rather than comic. Does this movie have something interesting to say about family, about cross-cultural relationships, about being a Jewish American in the 2020s? If so, it was so threadbare that I saw through it.