The Joneses (2009)
The basic storyWhat appears to be a perfect family with a perfect life moves into a suburban neighborhood. The perfect couple Steve and Kate Jones, and their gorgeous and popular teen-aged children Jenn and Mick, with all their cool cars, gadgets, clothes, assesories etc. The family is really a team of people working together to boost the sales of selected goods like TVs, jewelry, furnitures, gadgest, sports gear etc. in the area, by product placement. For the most part, the idea works really well. People believe the story and sales in the area are up, but then things start to go wrong.
How was it?
Mediocre. It was an interesting idea, and the actors did their best with what they were given. It could have been a great movie, if they had just focused on the new and interesting part: How the industry finds new ways to do product placement, how gullible, mean or thoughtless people can be, and how much a lot of people needs to show how happy they are and how well they are doing... or show a façade in the absense of wealth and/or happiness. Basically they should have made the movie the same as the one they show on the poster. Instead they focused on a lovestory we have seen a million times before. While the lovestory was relevant it should have been the secondary story, not the primary. Same thing with the kids. The son turns out to be gay and the daughter has an affair with a married man. So what? Yes it is relevant, but we have seen it a million times before, whereas how the product placement would actually work, is only mentioned briefly. We know the team is successful in getting people to buy all sorts of products, but we only see a few of the things they do and we don't see how the effect spreads. With only 96 minutes of movie, they could easily have added 10 to 15 minutes more, making the movie about selling the American dream as it says on the poster.
Rating
★★★★★
96 min.
Color
- Michael Pilgaard