Babes

The trailer for Babes made me laugh so I decided to see it at the Broadway last night.  It wasn't as funny as I thought it would be but I did enjoy the poignant look at female friendship.  Dawn (Michelle Buteau) is a married dentist with a young son and a baby on the way and Eden (Ilana Glazer) is a single and free-spirited yoga instructor.  They have been best friends since they were eleven years old and support each other in everything, including when Dawn goes into labor early while the two of them are watching a movie together.  When Eden unexpectedly becomes pregnant after a one night stand, she expects Dawn to help her through every aspect of pregnancy.  Dawn is struggling to adjust to the addition of a second child to her family and is feeling guilty about returning to work so soon after the birth so she feels like Eden is demanding more than she can give.  Their friendship is tested but they eventually realize how much they mean to each other.  I am not a big fan of crude humor so all of the jokes about bodily fluids (so many bodily fluids!) started to get really old for me but there are lots of genuinely funny moments that made me and the rest of the audience laugh out loud.  Much of the humor involves the secondary characters, my favorites of which are Eden's OB-GYN (John Carroll Lynch) and his ever evolving hair styles and her back-up doula Dragana (Elena Ouspenskaia).  However, both Buteau and Glazer have tremendous chemistry together and they really sell the idea that they have been inseparable since childhood in their performances.  I loved the realistic portrayal of what happens to friends who find themselves at different stages in life but still try to prioritize the friendship (I was single with a very close friend who was married with a baby when I was in my early twenties and this had me feeling the feels).  Your enjoyment of this movie will definitely depend on your tolerance for crude humor but there is enough heart for me to recommend it!