“If you’re uncomfortable, you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.”

Emily

A couple newly moved to LA at a dinner party with gregarious new friends is a familiar lens through which to explore the awkwardness of learning and engaging with new people outside of our comfort zone. Produced by the Duplass brothers, The Overnight bears tonal similarities to Cyrus and is similarly somewhat missold as a comedy. The uneasy atmosphere is more successful maintained here over the course of a single evening rather than a protracted relationship, though the film oversteps on a few occasions, breaking the tension with the unnecessarily “outrageous”, like a scene with risible prosthetic genitalia. Its chief strength is Jason Schwartzman’s shifting energy between eccentric generosity and manipulative coercion, keeping the audience — as much as his guests — guessing as to his motives.

7/10