The trailer for “The Longest Week” asks the question “what happens when an aimless rich dude gets cut off from his family’s wealth, and has to move in with his rich friends?” The answer to that question is who gives a shit? In this film, Jason Bateman plays a rich kid who is financially cut off by his father and moves in with Billy Crudup. And it seems that the bulk of this movie centers around Bateman and Crudup fighting over Olivia Wilde. I feel like I’m getting a migraine from all the scumbaggery present in this trailer.
Let me admit right now that I am a classist. I’m not proud of it, in fact it’s one of my worst qualities. It doesn’t matter that it’s politically correct to hate the rich, I’ll be the first to admit it’s just plain bigotry. For as long as I can remember, I’ve been incredibly resentful of the ridiculously affluent and, as a consequence, have always loathed movies about them (unless they used the money for something rad, like building airplanes or vigilante justice.) My classism has kept me from liking movies that the world around me has pretty much unanimously agreed are great, like ‘Rushmore’ or the ‘Royal Tenenbaums’ (and I’m sure a mountain of non-Wes Anderson movies as well.) I can tell this is going to be one of those movies that I hate because of my classism.
There is a moment in the trailer where Jenny Slate makes me think that this movie might be slightly self-aware. She asks “how am I supposed to care about a group of over-privileged, affluent types who go gallivanting around without any sort of a moral compass?” Bateman immediately responds “the affluent have plenty of problems.” Yeah, one “longest week” of problems. Blow me.