The Upside focuses on Dell Scott, played by Kevin Hart, an ex-con who needs to get a certain amount of signatures so that he doesn’t get sent back to jail for breaking his parole. He winds up landing a job with rich quadriplegic Phillip Lacasse, played by Bryan Cranston, serving as his live-in caretaker. While at first the two don’t seem to be a good match, mainly due to Dell’s inexperience with this line of work, the two eventually begin to hit it off and change each other’s lives for the better.
This film is an English-language remake of the 2011 French film The Intouchables. For those who have seen the original, there will be something glaringly obvious all throughout The Upside: This film is essentially a shot-for-shot remake of the original film, with little to nothing else added. The film opens with Phil and Dell in a car on the run from the police, just like the original movie. The film then flashes back to Dell when he’s first looking for a job, just like the original. And so on, and so forth.
There’s little this movie does to distinguish it from its French counterpart, other than adding any distinct Americanisms to signify the shift in culture, such as Phil now using an Alexa. And in fact, the movie wants to make absolutely certain that it the audience feels exactly as those who saw The Intouchables did that it particularly highlights the more emotional moments with manipulative sappy music that feels straight out of a soap opera.
The film takes certain emotional exchanges between characters in the original, and doubles down on them here with the conversations being more heated and filled with plenty of cliched dialogue. All the usual phrases are heard here, ranging from, “I needed you,” to “You don’t care about anyone but yourself.” There are plenty of times where it feels conflict will be made for the sake of creating conflict. Phil and Dell will be getting along perfectly fine in one scene, and then with little to no explanation, suddenly go at each other’s throats with hurtful insults, just to keep the movie going for another few minutes longer than it needed to.
The only major change this movie makes from the original is expanding the role of Phil’s personal assistant. Here, Yvonne, played by Nicole Kidman, is much more involved in the day-to-day of Phil’s life, and there’s a subplot in which she finds any excuse she can to let Dell go. The film tries to play up the fact that she’s an important role in Phil’s life, but outside of one scene that lasts for maybe a minute, there’s never a reason given why anyone should like her. She spends most of the movie being angry and bitter, and she’s only given a more prominent role just to create further conflict, rather than being a fully fleshed-out character. Which is a shame, because Kidman is a great actress and does a solid job in the role, working well with what she’s given, even if she’s misused.
The only reason this movie is watchable at all are its two leads. While Phil and Dell are written to be exactly the same characters as they were in the original, at least Bryan Cranston and Kevin Hart do a great job each bringing them to life for American audiences. In terms of these two simply reenacting all the big moments from the original, they actually do a commendable job, as it’s clear they both actually did put effort in their roles. And while they are solid in scenes on their own, the two shine the most when they’re together, as they have a surprising amount of chemistry with one another.
And not every scene of them together is completely manipulative of the audience’s emotions. They do manage to joke around with each other a lot. While some of the jokes are cringe-worthy and fall completely flat - one scene in particular revolves around one long penis joke - any time these two simply trade playful one-liners, it adds a little bit of charm to this.
The Upside is simply an inferior rehash of the original, much better The Intouchables. It’s manipulative through its use of cliched dialogue and sappy music, and it does little in terms of writing to really give itself a distinct personality. There are plenty of eye-rolling moments throughout here that will have audiences cringing. I’d say avoid this movie, but for those who are interested in seeing Bryan Cranston and Kevin Hart work together, it is worth checking out at least once. While the movie doesn’t completely cash in on their potential together, they are fun when they get to share the screen, and make this tolerable enough to make it all the way through the end.
Recommendation: Proceed With Caution
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