Another Simple Favor is the C-ntiest Movie

Have you ever watched a movie and thought “what this needs is 500% more c-nt”? Well, Paul Feig, Anna Kendrick, Blake Lively, and Jessica Sharzer sure have, because they’re all back for Another Simple Favor, a sequel to the 2018 dark comedy A Simple Favor. Feig once again directs; Sharzer co-writes the script with Laeta Kalogridis; Kendrick returns as plucky PTA mom and true crime investigator Stephanie Smothers; Lively is back as Emily, the glamorous blonde mom who is equal parts bitchy and enigmatic; and they have turned the c-ntometer all the way to eleven.

Emily is out of jail and getting married and she wants Stephanie to be her maid of honor even though Stephanie is now a famous true crime author best known for putting Emily behind bars. It looks like an obvious setup for Emily to get revenge on Stephanie for blowing up her life, which resulted in Emily not seeing her son, Nicky (Ian Ho), for five years while she was in jail. But Stephanie agrees under threat of lawsuit, and she whisks off to Capri on a private jet belonging to Emily’s mysterious fiancé, Dante Versano (Michele Morrone). From the beginning the fashion is bold and the c-nt is served, as Emily and Stephanie engage in thinly veiled threats and schemes. 

This time around, Feig & Co. trade the suburbs for sunny, picturesque Capri, providing plenty of beautiful locations and dizzying shots of the rugged Italian coastline, all lensed by cinematographer John Schwartzman, working with a strong c-nt filter. Everything about Another Simple Favor is c-nty, from the performances to the dialogue to the clothes to the camera pans. Another Simple Favor is an instant classic of c-nt cinema, a genre which includes the works of John Waters, Jennifer’s Body, The Craft, Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion, Death Becomes Her, and the “parlor stroll” scene from Pride & Prejudice (2005). 

Another Simple Favor is about lewks and c-nt. Emily? Queen c-nt. Stephanie? Mother c-nt. Allison Janney? Auntie c-nt. Elizabeth Perkins? Mother c-nt by way of a Lifetime movie of the week. Nicky? Pint-sized c-nt. Portia Versano, Dante’s intimidating mother? Mamma figa. The fashion? Fantasy vacation c-nt vibes. The men of Another Simple Favor are not serving, though, they have negative c-nt energy. They are drips and exist solely to be drippy and advance plotlines so that the women can indulge in Italian c-ntery. 

It is at Emily’s spectacular citrus-colored rehearsal lunch that Portia Versano (Elena Sofia Ricci) springs Emily’s mother, Margaret (Elizabeth Perkins, taking over for Jean Smart), and long-lost aunt, Linda (Allison Janney), on Emily as a surprise gift. It’s a c-nt checkmate. Making Emily’s side of the aisle worse is her bitter ex-husband, Sean (Henry Golding), the drippiest of all drips, killing the vibe for everyone, at least until someone kills him. This launches Stephanie into Detective C-nt mode, as she tries to solve Sean’s murder while everything spins out of control around her. No one is well in this film, everyone needs therapy, and no one is getting it. It’s giving incest, secret identities, double crosses, and seaside Pinterest mood boards.

Forward character momentum means that Stephanie is no longer the apologetic muffin mom she was in the first film, she squares up to Emily from minute one, and the two women throw so much shade they’re on the dark side of the moon. But Stephanie is experiencing a crisis of confidence as an investigator, after a suspect dies by suicide in front of her while proclaiming his innocence. She has to regain her c-nt-fidence in time to solve Sean’s murder while avoiding being murdered herself. In a very dark and twisted way, Another Simple Favor shows supportive female friendship, as Emily helps Stephanie rediscover her baddest self so that she can be her best self, but one thing Stephanie never stops being is a total c-nt. She is throwing suspicion and side-eye from minute one. 

Fans of A Simple Favor, fans of c-nt cinema, and people who like it when women are a little bit mean to them will like Another Simple Favor for its twists, turns, ludicrous visual and costumes, and frothy take on revenge thrillers. Sticks in the mud who don’t like “Abracadabra” or drag shows will be confused and say the film is “bad” but what they mean is that they feel certain that This Film Is Not For Them. Because it isn’t. Another Simple Favor is for the c-nts, the ones who prize style and expression and comebacks so sharp they leave claw marks. It’s for bitches who don’t apologize and witches who curse their enemies and sapphics who wish Hitchcock movies had more f-cking. But most of all, Another Simple Favor is for c-nts who like their c-ntery served with a side of chilled revenge. Because if revenge isn’t c-nty, it’s just sparkling payback.

Another Simple Favor is now streaming exclusively on Prime Video.