Sisters review: Attack of the (almost) clones

In Jason Moore’s raucous and potty-mouthed comedy, chalk “n” cheese siblings rediscover their childhoods and carelessly rub salt into old wounds as they search for a clear path through the detritus of their unfulfilling fortysomething routines. Or the trailers that did Sisters no favors. And it’s all brisk, bright, some of it even quite sweet, and very, very amusing. Fey is somewhat less well cast, but she’s clearly having fun as the irresponsible older sister Kate, who refuses to acknowledge the effect her party-girl lifestyle has on her teenage daughter Haley (Madison Davenport).

Sisters often seems less like a movie than a substance-fueled free-for-all that cameras just happened to catch.

The sisters are summoned back to their hometown of Orlando because their parents, played by Dianne Wiest and James Brolin, have sold their cherished family home and need their adult children to pack up their high school bedrooms, filled with ’80s detritus. Poehler is Maura, her “everything is beautiful” sister.

Sisters is written by Paula Pell, who, like Fey, is a veteran of the long-running American sketch show, Saturday Night Live. Sisters sags in the middle, when too many familiar faces from SNLs past and present are shoved into the ensemble (although Bobby Moynihan and an underused Kate McKinnon are great). So, I started to go, ‘I could totally see this. What only makes this situation that much funnier is the story arc that Kate Ellis, Tina Feys character, goes through in the movie.

The fun includes the inevitable dance number and trying on clothes montage and some brief appearances by John Cena and “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s” Santino Fontana.

Tina Fey may play the troublesome older sister in her upcoming comedy, but it looks like in real life, the doting mom has her work cut out for her when it comes to her youngest daughter Penelope. But therein lies the rub.

Sisters won’t be the first time Fey and Poehler have played, well, sisters. That’s when a movie is effectively defined by its title and the casting of the lead actors – like “Chris Rock is Head of State”, or “Dwayne Johnson is the Tooth Fairy, ” or perhaps the non plus ultra of this notion, “Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito are Twins”.

There’s some surprisingly amusing (albeit racist) bits between Poehler and Greta Lee as Hae-wan, a Korean nail specialist who shows up to party with her friends but never really delivers many laughs beyond the pronunciation of her name. In a behind-the-scene-style takeoff, they trade quips in Daisy Ridley-like British accents amid a spoof of special effects and image-capturing get-ups. Both have their own foibles and issues, and both have trouble letting go of their childhood home, in part because neither thinks she has a home anymore.

Poehler, on the other hand, who recently had her hair dyed red, slouched in her seat and motioned to Fey for her not to acknowledge that she was there.

“There’s nothing as comforting as your parents’ house”, states Fey, from Pennsylvania. It’s hard not to relate to that. She’s a nurse in Atlanta who aims to warm every heart she meets, while Kate just wants to drink up and chill out.