I can find humor in the crude R-rated comedies that have content that’s actually funny – but those that solely rely on repeatedly vulgar and unfunny gags are the worst. Unfortunately, The To Do List is one of the latter.
The main purpose of CBS Films’ The To Do List is to serve as a generic trial for Parks and Recreation star Aubrey Plaza. It tests the waters to see if she’s got what it takes to carry a movie entirely on her own. While I’ve enjoyed Plaza in the past (see Safety Not Guaranteed), if her future as a lead actress depends completely on the merits of her performance in The To Do List, she’ll never play a lead again.
For no reason, The To Do List is set in the mid-’90s in Idaho. Plaza plays 18-year-old Brandy Klark, a goodie-goodie high school valedictorian whose two best friends (Arrested Development‘s Alia Shawkat and Spanglish‘s Sarah Steele) are everything that she’s not – they’ve got potty mouths, don’t mind sneaking alcohol, and they’re sexually experienced. Despite the temptations of her unlikely friends, Brandy is unswayable – except for when she sees an attractive college boy (Speed Racer‘s Scott Porter). All of a sudden, Brandy is determined to not only lose her virginity to the typical womanizing jock, but to be sexually prepared for it before then. Instead of filling her Trapperkeeper with to-do lists of nerdiness, she loads it up with every sexual act but the actual “deed” and once the list is completely checked, she’ll “go all the way.”
As if the lack of real comedy wasn’t bad enough, the predictably formulaic story bogs it down. There’s the male buddy (Scott Pilgrim‘s Johnny Simmons) whom has liked her for ages, but she’s so caught up on banging her target that she sets her buddy up for failure. Everything that happens can be seen from a mile away, the only exception being the graphic sexual images portrayed on screen. Over the last decade, horror movies have shifted to focusing on “shock value.” The To Do List does the same thing, but with dirty images instead of grizzly ones.
I haven’t seen this summer’s latest successful R-rated comedy The Heat, but I laughed harder during the trailer for The Heat than I did during entirety of The To Do List, so I’m going to recommend that you see The Heat instead. It must be funnier than The To Do List.
Photo credit: CBS Films
