No Hard Feelings: Jennifer Lawrence’s surprisingly good gross-out comedy

It might a gross-out comedy but No Hard Feelings is stealthily emotional and answers the question of what is Jennifer Lawrence doing here.

No Hard Feelings is in cinemas from June 22. Picture: Sony

No Hard Feelings has a premise that sounds, on the surface, pretty basic.

A thirty-something woman on the verge of losing her house agrees to an unconventional arrangement in which she will date and bed a socially awkward 19-year-old in exchange for a car.

It’s a coming-of-age comedy, a gross-out sex comedy, and an opposites attract comedy. It’s seemingly following so many tropes, the first question you ask is, “What is Oscar winner and superstar Jennifer Lawrence doing in this?”

But Lawrence’s mere presence hints that No Hard Feelings is more than its cover.

The other clue is that the movie is co-written and directed by Gene Stupnitsky, a filmmaker best known for his work with creative partner Lee Eisenberg, with whom he has written many episodes of The Office US, made the raucously funny Good Boys and co-created recent hit Jury Duty.

So, Stupnitsky has form, but he has mostly worked with Eisenberg so there was a question of whether this would be a Ricky Gervais/Stephen Merchant thing where the projects they did without the other were never as alchemic as what they created together.

No Hard Feelings Picture: Sony

No Hard Feelings is a cunningly good movie. It is uproariously, sometimes outrageously, hilarious but it also has a beating heart of emotional gravity. That’s the thing that sneaks up on you.

And it’s also why you have someone of Lawrence’s calibre because she can take a character with seemingly one-dimensional motivations and deliver eons of pathos in movie you expect none from.

Lawrence plays Maddie, a 32-year-old mess who fears getting close to anyone and works as an Uber driver and a bartender. Maddie put her dreams of surfing the California coast when her mum got sick and since then, has stayed put in the small community where’s she lived all her life.

She lives in Montauk, a seaside village and popular holiday spot for cashed-up New Yorkers whose money, mega mansions and gentrification have driven up property taxes for locals including Maddie.

No Hard Feelings Picture: Sony

When Maddie’s car is repossessed, she has no way to make the cash necessary to keep her house, so an online ad from a pair of helicopter parents (Matthew Broderick, Laura Benanti) proposing a free car for dating and deflowering their son, the introverted, college-bound Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman).

Percy rarely leaves his room and is scared of all social interaction. When Maddie comes onto him – and strongly – Percy’s earnestness and doe-eyed innocence butts up against her seductions.

There’s plenty of physical comedy, including a nude beach frolic, and plenty of mild movie violence being played for laughs. And a repeated needle drop of Hall & Oates’ “Maneater” is used to great comedic effect.

All that entertainment is underscored by the parallel coming-of-age stories of both Percy and Maddie, even if they’re 13 years apart. They both have to confront what it is that keeps them trapped in their own worlds – his in his room and hers in a town that has little left for her.

No Hard Feelings is surprisingly smart and tender, and balances the difficult task of being gross-out funny and achingly sweet.

Rating: 3/5

No Hard Feelings is in cinemas from Thursday, June 22