Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice Plays in a Genre Sandbox
Where to begin with a review of BenDavid Grabinski’s Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice? Maybe to warn you, dear reader and potential viewer, that it contains the most egregiously (and purposely) painful Dave Matthews Band needle drop this side of Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird. Or to note that Vince Vaughan references another character named Bob the Tomato—a character that, alas, we never actually meet. Or to categorize this as another entry in the subgenre of Stephen Root’s ominous oddballs. Or perhaps it’s best to start where the movie starts, with a frazzled Ben Schwartz giving an absurd karaoke performance in a lonely science lab before everything goes haywire.
But no, I’m afraid this is all making it seem unserious. Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice bears serious cinephile roots. Its very title declares as much through its loving bastardization of Elaine May’s Mikey and Nicky, a portrait of fractured masculinity and male friendship, and Paul Mazursky’s Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice. In fact, the first interaction between Mike and Nick, a conversation occurring across a closed hotel door, is taken straight from the opening of May’s excellent film. With a cinematic family tree like that, this must be an unfiltered arthouse sleeper. And it’s just that: the kind of film where Vince Vaughn’s Nick time travels to the past to fight himself in a gas station and—okay, wait—
Restart. Grabinski’s film throws us into yet another cinematic cadre of gangsters, and the stakes are evident from the first scene. Mike (James Marsden) is looking to retire so that he can leave all this violence and chaos behind. But there’s a traitor in the midst of this underworld, and there will only be more blood spilled before the night is through. Mike and Nick, though, are no strangers to bloodshed. This is their world, and they are practiced in their arts, be it gunplay or disposing of bodies or debating which Gilmore Girls boyfriend is the best.
Alright alright, so maybe Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice isn’t a raw, Scorsese-inflected gangster film. Or the obscure catnip meant to entice the most esoteric of Criterion stans. What Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice is, as all of those ampersands in the title hint at, is a mash-up. It’s as much Looper as Elaine May, as much Shane Black as New Hollywood. It’s a gangster action comedy revolving around the core relationships between these two men, Nick’s wife (that would be Eiza González’s Alice), and Mike’s lover (that would also be Eiza González’s Alice). Mike’s betrayal of Nick’s trust is just as pertinent as the traitor in the organization, and both issues will need to be resolved if they’re to survive.
Grabinski is well versed in the various genres he’s playing with, which gives him the chance to contort the language of genre per his whim. The first fight between Mike and Present Nick is a highlight of these gymnastics, as the scene is littered with quick, delightful gags. Vaughn does some emotional contorting of his own to affect two versions of Nick that actually feel disparate. It’s well and good, but it results in the odd situation where Marsden and Vaughn’s connection is marked by quick-fire charm when the scene involves Future Nick, but becomes frustratingly stilted when Mike is conversing with Present Nick. Part of this is due to the script—Present Nick is holding a grudge against Mike, leaving Future Nick to play therapist. But the movie oddly captures Vaughn coming up against the limits of his acting finesse.
It’s a point of fracture in a film that otherwise proceeds smoothly and unhindered. A little too smoothly, actually—Grabinski’s film is a bit weightless. It’s too light to leave much of a mark. It has a nice sheen, but there’s not much below the surface. The film is fun for what it seeks to accomplish, and its aims are ultimately humble. It never takes itself too seriously, and it finds inventive laughs as it toys with cinematic stereotypes. (This is a film where the gangsters have monikers like Dumbass Tony and Roid Rage Ryan.) If you can find the humor in Papa Roach needle drops, nonsensical deus ex machinas, and rewiring of familiar time travel tropes, you will likely have an enjoyable, if ephemeral, experience with Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice.
