Whilst it shouldn’t have taken as long as 7 years for us to be gifted a sequel to 2018’s comedic thriller A Simple Favour – a quirky piece that played out like Gone Girl rinsed through the cycle of a soap opera – director Paul Feig (Bridesmaids, Spy) and writers Jessica Sharzer (who also penned the original) and Laeta Kalogridis (Shutter Island, Alita: Battle Angel) prove the wait was more than worth it with Another Simple Favour, a delicious, twisted black comedy that takes all the melodramatic charm of its predecessor and cranks them to an 11.
The first film had its share of intrigue and wild plot twists as it followed mousey vlogger Stephanie (Anna Kendrick) and her navigation of the toxic friendship she shared with Emily (Blake Lively), an impossibly chic fashion company PR snake, who asked “a simple favour” and led her naive cohort down a rabbit hole of murder and mystery. Feig’s comedic inclinations as a filmmaker and the effortless handling of its camp tone in the capable hands of both Kendrick and Lively allowed the film to exist successfully as a comedy that was genuinely thrilling and as a thriller that was all too aware of how over-the-top it was.
Such a mentality has been adhered for Another Simple Favour, but, seemingly aware that the winking of playing to the audience was what made the first film so supremely enjoyable, it opts be a lot more. Like, a LOT more. Like, mafia, in-family blackmail, unhinged siblings, being-murdered-in-the-shower more. All taking place in the luxuriousness of Italy, of course.
The film assumes its audience are well aware of the actions that have taken place in the lead up to its opening, so it simply opens on Stephanie (once again so beautifully played by the erratic, sarcastic Kendrick) informing her social media followers that she’s under house arrest in Italy for a murder she didn’t commit. We go back a few days to see that she’s in the throws of a book tour, having written a novel – “The Faceless Blonde” – about her experiences surviving the cunning nature of attempted murderess Emily. Swanning into frame like she’s dominating a runway (not dissimilar to how she entered the first film), Emily (and say what you will about Lively in this current state of It Ends With Us lawsuit he-said-she-said, she’s so wickedly grand with her acerbic wit) reenters Stephanie’s life, casually dropping that she’s out of prison and ready to move on.
In a lavish striped suit, complete with chainlink belt and bedazzled heels (it really can’t be stressed enough how beautiful the work is from costume designer Renée Ehrlich Kalfus), Emily doesn’t have the air of someone who was incarcerated for killing her sister and near-fatally shooting her husband, Sean (Henry Golding). But, thanks to some high-powered attorneys paid for by a past-time lover, Dante Versano (Michele Morrone), she’s out on appeal and may or may not be plotting her next moves as an essentially free woman. Stephanie’s naturally uneasy, but Emily doesn’t want to rehash their old drama. She wants to conjure fresh theatrics, and so, in front of her audience at her book signing, Emily asks Stephanie to be her maid of honour. Oh yeah, she’s marrying Dante, who just so happens to be a powerful mafioso, and springing for all to attend their Italian-set wedding.
What could possibly go wrong?
There’s already a lot to take in, and Another Simple Favour has barely cracked the 10 minute mark at this point. But in the film offering up so many narrative strands and exploring the complicated knots of “friendship” between its hoard of players, it’s wildly aware that the more twisted it is, the more we’ll be invested. It may throw in one too many revelations as it ties itself up, but, much like Stephanie and Emily, we live for the drama as audience members, and when everyone is having so much fun, it’s all too easy to get sucked in to the lunacy of it all. Another Simple Favour plays nothing seriously, and that’s why it’s as good as it is.
In between the swigs of liquor and catty retorts (Emily insults Sean’s manhood, likening his penis to a belly button, to which he remarks on her “cavernous vagina”), the clearly unhappy mother-in-law-to-be (Elena Sofia Ricci‘s Portia) wanting nothing more than for her Dante to come to his senses, and the left-of-centre arrivals of Emily’s off-her-rocker mother (Elizabeth Perkins, replacing Jean Smart from the first) and estranged aunt (Allison Janney), who makes her presence a little more immediately known than what feels comfortable, the cavalcade of players all dipping in and out across the film’s 2 hours offer up their own reasonings for wanting to commit a crime of sorts. We just don’t know who or what will be the ultimate play.
There’s more than a few murders that ultimately take place by the time the film wraps itself up, and given just who ends up in a proverbial body bag, Feig and co. truly adopt the mentality that no one is safe and anything can happen. The camp factor being as high as it is means, to some, the mystery element might be slightly subdued, but it also has to be so self-aware, otherwise the constant reveal-upon-reveal temperament wouldn’t be as digestible. If you thought the first film reveled in the ridiculous, Another Simple Favour very much adheres to the notion of “hold my beer”, or, more correctly, “hold my martini.”
Whether or not you want to read into the gossip surrounding the film regarding Kendrick and Lively’s off-screen dynamic is up to the individual, but there’s no denying that their barbed energy is perfectly matched and what truly makes this unbridled, mischievous sequel worth the watch. Stephanie probably shouldn’t agree to anymore “favours” from Emily, but if Feig, Kendrick and Lively are able to muster another, bonkers adventure for this pestilential pair, a further favour is the least they could do when they’re delivering such scrumptiousness in spades.
FOUR STARS (OUT OF FIVE)
Another Simple Favour is available to stream on Prime Video from May 1st, 2025.
