| Netflix | Release Date (Streaming): April 1, 2022 | CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION | ||
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Positive:
3
Mixed:
19
Negative:
12
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Critic Reviews
Mar 31, 2022
The Bubble works in fits and spurts, especially in its first half. The cast is game, and even the respective branches of the Apatow family tree get plenty of chances to prod at the validity and privilege of Hollywood actors finally enduring a crumb of suffering. But it suffers from the same issues as most Apatow pictures; it’s too long and aimless, swimming around its critiques of Tinseltown without really nailing a concrete target for its satire.
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The Film StageMar 31, 2022
Bits and pieces work—an underused Maria Bakalova, in one of her first post-Borat roles, stands out as she contends with Dieter’s advances; there are a few laughs seeing Carol dealing with a crumbling relationship at home with no way to intervene; Dustin placing more importance over this franchise than his newly adopted son––but The Bubble‘s vast majority plays as Day for Night for dummies. Comedy can certainly be extracted from the strange new world we find ourselves in, but Apatow’s project is a meta experiment in search of a purpose beyond delivering a few scant chuckles.
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Apr 1, 2022
Less is almost always more, but the creative freedom afforded by Netflix must have meant that the director, co-writer, and producer didn’t feel obligated to leave much on the cutting room floor. As a result, The Bubble throws everything and the kitchen sink into the mix, but very little of it manages to stick.
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The IndependentMar 31, 2022
The Bubble’s script is credited to Apatow and Team America co-writer Pam Brady, and there are occasional flashes of barbed, satirical wit here. Generally, though, The Bubble resembles a flutter of loose ideas, to which a vast ensemble of reliably funny actors have been tasked with adding colour.
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Mar 31, 2022
There’s a freewheeling spirit to The Bubble that’s meant to reflect the times during which the film was made, but instead of creative forces finally unleashed it comes off as half-baked, more like a first draft than a finished film. Apatow knows comedy, and his intentions here are good. It’s just the movie that isn’t.
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IndieWireMar 31, 2022
Apatow gets a lot of shit for making scattershot comedies that run the length of David Lean epics, but the patchwork of scenes that comprise his latest have less in common with “Funny People” than they do “Movie 43,” and might just be aimless enough to make the director’s critics appreciate the flow of his earlier work.
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Mar 31, 2022
Think of The Bubble as part of a pattern we could have anticipated. Pandemic movies almost can’t be any good at this point. The pandemic won’t be funny, interesting or anything anybody wants to think about until we’re safely beyond it by a few years. So, filmmakers, set your watches for pandemic nostalgia to commence circa 2027, and between now and then, just put it out of your minds.
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The TelegraphMar 31, 2022
Some of the jokes here are so bad they may be legally actionabubble, even prosecutabubble, and will cause toes to curl on the feet of the hitherto unembarrassabubble. There are scenes now seared upon my memory through sheer force of murderous un-funniness which I fear may prove to be unscrubbabubble.
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