Review: The Players
The Skinny:
I’m going to save you a lot of time here … there are almost no redeeming qualities to Netflix’s The Players (Gli Infedeli). In fact, I’m not really sure what I can compare this to, as I’m not really sure who the intended audience is. Men with fantasies about cheating on their wives? Men who have cheated on their wives and wished they had made it to the other side with zero consequences? People that have somehow made it through the vast collection of streaming options and have nothing else to watch? This is a film whose tone varies between mildly insensitive to full blown misogynistic, and whose stories and dialogue are unironically stereotypical of both men and women.
The Background:
The Players is based on a French film with the same title starring academy award winner Jean Dujardin. I’m not sure how related the two versions are, because this wasn’t exactly a ringing endorsement to go back and watch the French version. You would think that it couldn’t be any worse, but the trailer doesn’t inspire confidence.
The Italian remake stars Riccardo Scamarcio, Valerio Mastandrea, and Massimiliano Gallo as the titular “Players”, and due to the vignette format, they all play more than one character throughout the film. This can get a bit confusing, but it’s important to remember that each story is distinct and nothing really builds together here. If you’re a fan of Scamarcio or Mastandrea, there are already better options on Netflix, such as Ruthless (Lo Spietato) and Euphoria. Valentina Cervi, Marina Foïs, and especially Laura Chiatti try to rescue the film with their roles, but they’re fighting an uphill battle.
The Plot:
Does the plot really matter at this point? The film features six vignettes: A wife discovering her husband’s infidelity before a vacation, a married couple copping to and attempting to justify their indiscretions, a creep trying to score during a company convention, a curious wife discovering her husband’s glory hole addiction, a sociopathic man gaslighting his spouse, and three friends discussing their voracious sexual appetites over dinner.
Trust me, it’s worse than it sounds.
The Bottom Line:
This is the worst of all Netflix’s Italian language films thus far. It’s pitched as a comedy about infidelity, but the only time you’ll laugh is when you ask yourself how and why this film was made. The sad thing is that this collection of actors has talent as they’ve shown in other works, but almost every line of the script is dripping with tiresome cliches. The men at the center of each of these vignettes are loathesome at a molecular level, and yet almost always manage to get the last “laugh”. Not every movie needs to have a moral or redemptive quality, and there are some excellent films that have make you feel uncomfortable by way of their transgressive nature. This is not one of those films. I am a sucker for some good choices on the soundtrack though, so …
The Players earns a solitary half pizza out of five pizzas.
