The Problem with ‘The Drama’

I walked out of The Drama. It scared me, because I’d also walked out of the new Avatar movie, at around the same point: the climax. I recall seeing a shot of bodies in a wedding venue, and guessing it was just some sort of fear-induced vision or other ‘this isn’t real’ gimmick, and decided enough was enough. I read the wikipedia synopsis in my car in the parking lot, scoffed, and drove home to watch Agents of SHIELD.

What follows is a review cobbled together based on a short text conversation I had while discussing the movie. Spoiler alert.

Dark Humor? Or Edgelord Ragebait?

The film The Drama is based on a single revelation that Zendaya, when she was a child, planned on, and almost followed through with, shooting up her school.

Let’s take a moment. Let’s take a fucking moment. Let’s take an all-American, red white and blue-blooded, patriotism induced erection moment. School shooting. Ok. 

So The Drama meant to be a dark comedy. My primary and initial question was why did they choose something so dark? Was cheating too mundane? The film could have recreated the same sort of “dude freaks out about a dark secret he’s learned about his fiance just days before marriage”. I kept wondering why they couldn’t have picked a less controversial topic, or a topic that had a more aligned metaphor to marriage? Maybe a metaphor that said something about the relationship between Zendaya and Robert Pattinson? 

The school shooting topic deserves and needs more depth in order for it to work. Otherwise, the film is just using a serious, emotionally devastating topic that strikes real fear into people as a fucking prop. 

I understand that dark comedies are meant to be edgy. As an easy alternative, they could have gone with cheating (more on this later), but this may almost be too personal or cliche to be edgy. The problem stops at the couple and maybe the other involved person, and it would be a stretch to connect it to all of the other characters. On the other hand, school shootings are a mass problem (in the USA). But the way that school shootings and their underlying reasons and the sociopolitic reasons they occur wasn’t discussed at all. There was a vague allusion to how young girls are exposed to glamorized, sexualized violence as a goal, but it was more Pattinson assuming that was the reason, rather than Zendaya admitting or discovering that that’s what caused her outburst.

One may think this movie paves the way for a deeper conversation about gun violence. You may say that it scratches the ice on this glacier of discussion. You can call The Baby ‘baby’s first anti school shooting movie’, in a way. Which. Uh… I mean ok?

Poor Conflict leads to Poor Drama

But y’know. This is entertainment. The filmmakers picked a theme but they didn’t put forward an opinion or worldview. Just some half baked humor and used the theme as a prop

I think that this movie wanted an excuse for interpersonal conflict and chose a poor catalyst. Which is interesting because other than Zendaya, every introduced character was pretty fucking shitty. They could have created any other issue. But because the story is so blah, they probably picked something shocking so the movie would be memorable. 

As a result, I personally felt that every single relationship, including the one between Zendaya and Pattinson, was unconvincing. What’s more, all of the outrage over Zendaya’s confession felt manufactured. It felt like a fake outrage. Which, considering the reaction one should have when it comes to a school shooting… It feels a little insulting. And because their reactions feel so manufactured, I was cynical of the whole thing. But maybe that was the point? Who knows.

I feel validated in my belief that this movie misused the central topic when we come to the ending. According to wikipedia- and not my own viewing- apparently Pattinson had an affair with his coworker? And somehow his guilt manifested and projected? But again. Invalidated because everyone else also had a very shocked reaction to Zendaya’s revelation. So how guilt-riddled was he really? Who knows. 

I admit, some people would be happy to gloss over the central theme and focus on the romance, or allow for the edgy topic to enjoy the intermittent humor. Fine. There were a lot of people who probably went that route and decided to just enjoy it. But compared to another A24 romcom, The Materialists, I think that The Drama is an inferior film, as it is unable to reach the same emotional highs or character depth of its predecessor. I thought that The Drama should be rated

YMMV

I saw it in theaters, but I’m sure it’ll come to Hulu or Tubi or something soon.

Wondering how my rating system works? Let me explain!