The Joneses

For about the first hour minutes of its run time The Joneses is a nicely paced, enjoyable, satire (along the lines of Thank You For Smoking) that has likable characters and an easy going charm. Unfortunately it takes a sharp left turn from subtlety with about twenty minutes left which almost kills the film's momentum completely. The story follows a 'family' of salespeople who move into a neighborhood for a year and essentially sell themselves (and really the products they own) to the community. This provides fertile ground for some nice observations about consumer culture, and the toll that constantly selling has on someone. The film is well cast, David Duchovny and Demi Moore have a nice chemistry as the leaders of the sales 'cell' and Amber Heard isn't unattractive as their 'daughter' (I really just felt like sounding like a Maxim writer there for a second). A film that just stayed with them and their internal struggles with the work they do it would have been fine. Unfortunately we have a incredibly telegraphed dramatic denouement which leads to a big speech and a whole section that feels incredibly out of place when compared to the rest of the film. I didn't even mind that the ending wasn't as bleak as it could have been, I just wish that the film had stuck to its guns and not felt the need to suddenly spell out everything thats been bubbling under the surface. Its still worth seeing, but it ultimately falls short of what it could have been.