Grade: B
Ridesharing services, such as Uber and Lyft, have been around for nearly a decade. Uber started in San Francisco in May 2010 then Lyft cruised onto the streets in 2012. The ridesharing services have helped to curb drunk driving and have made it easier than ever to get to an airport on your own. While I have used Uber and Lyft many times in my life, I have only had positive experiences each time with both companies and I will continue to use the ridesharing services over a traditional cab.
In the latest summer buddy cop comedy “Stuber,”the happy go lucky, cautious Uber driver, Stu (played by Kumail Nanjiani) takes the tough, no-nonsense cop Vic Manning (played by Dave Bautista) on the Uber ride of his life. Amo Cortez (played by Rene Moran) killed Manning’s partner and the feds want to handle the case because it has taken Manning a few years to handle it himself. Manning has lasik done and can’t drive well immediately following the procedure. Once Manning gets a hot tip on the case, he wastes no time and has to follow the lead. Stu unfortunately picks up Manning and ends up getting a crash course in Manning’s cop work. During Manning’s extended trip, Stu is eager to get back to his long time crush/friend/business partner who he is secretly in love with. Manning doesn’t really care about Stu’s love life and basically holds Stu hostage while he works on tracking down Cortez.
Bautista and Nanjiani had great on screen chemistry and they were excellent for your typical buddy cop movie. “Stuber” will have you laughing through the majority of its one hour and thirty three minute run time and it also serves up a decent amount of action. Since Nanjiani is a very good comic, the comedy was pretty spot on and nearly all of the jokes presented to the audience landed. Many audience members were laughing at the fast banter between Bautista and Nanjiani. The timing of the jokes were excellent. Fast paced, just like the story. The polar opposite demeanors of Bautista and Nanjiani alone was worth the price of admission. Bautista’s facial expressions were classic. The action was surprisingly very violent as you will see anything from bad guys getting shot at a close range to objects being imbedded in faces. Some of it was pretty gruesome. If you’re not a fan of blood, you might find yourself looking away quite often. Being that the movie’s plot is centered around an Uber driver, there were a few car chase scenes that were well done and helped keep the pacing of the movie at full throttle.
Even though I can’t give “Stuber” a five-star rating, I can safely say that I enjoyed my time with it and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a fun and entertaining movie that will make you laugh the entire ride. Uber with a few of your friends to the nearest theater to see “Stuber.” I just hope nothing too crazy happens to you on the way.