Film Review - The Breaker Upperers (2018)

The Breaker Upperers is written, directed and stars Madeleine Sami and Jamie Van Beek as Mel and Jen two women who run a break up agency for partners in New Zealand but when Mel feels that they have crossed the line a little bit with one case a woman named Anna she and Jen start to conflict over the agency and their friendship.

The Breaker Upperers worked best for me when it was just these 2 women running their agency and arranging separations for couples who don’t want to go through all of that messiness for themselves a times they pose as police officers to fake missing persons cases they go to peoples houses and even spy on them in public to try and find a way to break the news and all of it is great fun and Ms Sami and Ms Van Beek have great comedic chemistry that had me laughing quite a bit plus there was a great Kamehameha Wave reference that had me properly laughing out loud in my cinema seat.

But when the film takes on a more serious tone and the duo start to argue and go their separate ways it fell down for me as it felt like a lot of the same stuff I’d seen before the friends argue, one of them goes off and does something else, the other friend starts feeling guilty and they have an awkward reunion before they properly reconcile and I got a bit bored watching all of that stuff as again it didn’t feel fresh like the first half did it just felt familiar and that is a real disappointing thing to say.

And so that was the Breaker Upperers and regrettably it’s a disappointment for me as a really fun and fresh first half makes way for a familiar second half that I just didn’t like as much, 2 and a half out of 5.