Best Man Down

Scott and Kristin marry in Arizona. Lumpy, the best man, drinks heavily at the wedding and is found dead the next morning. The couple cancel their honeymoon and have to arrange the funeral. Lumpy has almost no family and nobody knows anything about him. Calling the numbers in his phone turns up the name of a fifteen year old girl in Minnesota. Nobody knows what the relationship was, and the first thing anyone thinks is the worst. Ted Koland writes and directs in his first film. The cast includes Justin Long, Jess Weixler, Tyler Labine and Addison Timlin. The structure runs in two times: the preparation of the funeral alternates with Lumpy's last months, and the audience learns the truth before the couple does. The subject is how well we know a person. Lumpy is the friend nobody quite likes, loud and embarrassing; after his death it emerges that he had a life nobody knew about. Tyler Labine's Lumpy is the best thing in the film, carried to a tragic place without the comedy being reduced at all. The winter and the small town set the tone; the Minnesota passages are cold and empty. The weakness is the couple's strand; the tension between Scott and Kristin is conventional and some scenes are unnecessary. Who it is for: viewers who like American independent drama and stories built on friendship. Who it is not for: the rhythm is uneven, the narrative turns on a secret, and the ending arrives at its emotional destination too quickly.