The Joneses (2009)

Directed by: Derrick Borte | 96 minutes | drama, comedy | Actors: Amber Heard, Demi Moore, David Duchovny, Gary Cole, Glenne Headly, Ben Hollingsworth, Lauren Hutton, Catherine Dyer, Chris Williams, Christine Evangelista, Justin Price, Robert Pralgo, Ashley LeConte Campbell, Mark Oliver, Tiffany Morgan, Kim Wall Andrew DiPalma, Wilbur Fitzgerald, Ric Reitz, Niko Stjepanovic

David Duchovny is back in top form. His Hank Moody from the hit series “Californication” has put the TV star back in recent years at the level where FBI agent Fox Mulder brought him – one of the most interesting characters on television at the time – in the 90s: top. Demi Moore, on the other hand, hasn’t accomplished anything for years – and at her best just does what a role expects of her. In addition, the script of light comedy drama ‘The Joneses’ requires only a very superficial depth of the perfect couple they have to portray, so that despite the successful premise, the film is hardly surprising.

Whoever dies with the most toys winsSteve Jones (Duchovny) suggests on the golf course when one of the other players makes a comment about his expensive watch. A motto that Steve and his model family live up to every day, by wallowing in the most beautiful clothes, the best gadgets and the most expensive cars. Steve, his wife Kate (Moore) and his two children (Amber Heard and Ben Hollingsworth) are part of an innovative and experimental new method of marketing: four employees who are linked together and present themselves as the perfect family to the outside world, in order to thus trying to get as many people as possible addicted to the products of the parent company. While the Joneses try to sell their entire household goods – or rather, image – to the neighborhood, you get the feeling that you yourself are just as much a test audience of a business experiment. For example, it dies on the streets of the Audis, every bottle of beer is one of Stella Artois and, just like the local residents, you are constantly convinced of the convenience of the new HTC phone. However, some products are put on a bit thicker, which adds to the comic note. A Japanese toilet that speaks to you and rinses you off after your visit, or sushi that no one wants to believe just comes out of the freezer. However, these practical jokes are sparse, the comic potential is underused. ‘The Joneses’ turns out to be primarily a drama and tries to touch on the theme of films such as ‘American Beauty’ and ‘Fight Club’, by forcing the viewer with the nose on the superficial life in the suburbia of the American Dream. A life in the service of (mass) consumption.

That message, and the addition that a successful life cannot be found in a mountain of gadgets, has been present from the start and is delivered with little subtlety. Steve sells a successful image, but finds himself less and less happy with it. Kate is a real career woman and finds fulfillment in her ambitious goals, but misses real life because of her work – Steve is already her sixth husband in a fake marriage. Daughter Jen is lived by her image and starts a relationship with a married man, while son Mick has his own love problems. The pretense that the family keeps up turns out to be exactly that. The drama only really gets big when it becomes clear what effect the sale of an expensive lifestyle has on the neighbours, although this is easily overlooked in the end.

The detail of ‘The Joneses’ is original in itself and has potentially numerous comedic possibilities, the drama of an ‘American Beauty’ and perhaps even the sinister of ‘The Stepford Wives’, especially when you consider how close this sketch is to the actual world comes. Unfortunately, only that middle angle is taken, and that in an unsurprising way. It is simply too predictable, the perfect family that turns out to be human deep inside. The biggest flaw, however, is not the fact that director and former advertising executive Derrick Borte ignores all that potential in his own script, but that he leaves the abilities of David Duchovny unused in the execution. His stoic nonchalance could have easily sold a stronger script full of cynical humor.