My Review of "Downhill"

Downhill is an interesting movie that can be interpreted in a lot of different ways. In a way it could be a reflection in the self reflection later on in older age. Then again it could also be looked at as a quirky awkward comedy. There are some laughs in this movie but you have to understand the type of humor to "get it". Today this sort of awkward humor is pretty popular and it's probably the only humor you can have in movies nowadays without people getting triggered and angry with a movie. So I don't blame this type of humor being more prevalent. The only thing is, it's not really my bag of humor.

This movie starts with the two main characters Billie and Pete. Pete is this the husband in the relationship and he's going through some self reflection as his father passed away 8 months ago. Billie is the wife in the relationship and she's having self reflections herself as to what's going on in her life.

They're a pretty well off family and they have 2 children. It's kind of weird that Pete has planned this family trip in a ski resort at a singles resort rather than a family resort 20 miles away. Things are starting to seem fishy and Billie already has a sense of this. Still she feels that she has to coddle Pete because of his father's passing. She accepts the little things that seem to be happening. They all seem to be little microaggressions throughout the day.

I'm already feeling the awkwardness throughout the movie strong right from the beginning and I'm not liking it. I know that it's meant to set the mood and to build up what's going to happen but it's just gets more and more intense. I kind of blame movies like Uncut Gems for this popularity in awkward tension. I hate it but people seem to love this sort of stuff so here's another movie for you if you liked Uncut Gems. The only twist is that there's more comedy in this movie than the aforementioned.

Things go awkwardly well for a bit until there's this controlled blast that causes a "controlled" avalanche. The problem with this avalanche is that it's bigger than the others. It actually comes into the ski village and as it does the family is out on a patio having brunch or something. Instead of staying with his family Pete picks up his phone and walks away.

This incident causes even more tension with Pete and Billie. It gets increasingly worse because Pete refuses to address the situation with Billie and things get exasperated. In a sense I could absolutely see this scenario playing out in real life because a lot of us have huge egos and can't admit that what we did was wrong even when it's obviously so. This is totally relatable and true to life so in a sense they nailed this aspect of the movie down. Some people will really like this aspect of the movie but I am not one of them. I don't want to live in reality when I watch movies I want to live in fantasy. Again for those that do like realism you might like this.

I guess you could equate this type of realistic awkward feeling to a horror movie. Some people just love that tension that they feel with horror movies and I get it but it also isn't my thing. You get that same sort of tension in this movie but it's not scary it's just uncomfortable. Sort of like the movie Marriage Story on Netflix. I watched that movie for a bit but couldn't fully complete it because it was so uncomfortable to watch that I just shut it off. That's why I never got to review that movie. This movie doesn't quite get to that point so I have to give them props for that.

Most of the comedy comes with Pete and Billie learning about themselves. They realize at what they excel at and what their faults are. The faults are pretty funny and the actors knock it out of the park by delivering in their performances.

I guess some people that love that realism might not really like the end of the movie though because it's kind of sugar coated in a way that it doesn't seem to quite fit the movie. They made these characters seem like Charlie Brown characters but then at the end he eventually kicks the football. It doesn't quite make sense but alleviates a ton of tension at the end. I don't know what to think about the ending because I like it but I don't like it as well.

Overall, This was an interesting movie that I think would do pretty well with people that like realistic type of stories and like to feel awkwardness in films. It's kind of weird because I thought society is full of people that feel anxiety already why would you want them to feel even more anxiety by watching this movie? I have to give this movie a 6.5 out of 10. It's watchable but not worth a repeat viewing.