Good news, grown-ups, even though most of the screens at your local theater are probably still devoted to “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie,” there’s a decent option for adults in one of the other houses. I’m convinced that “The Drama” has stayed in the top three at the domestic box office for the past two weekends by reeling in parents who don’t want to watch Mario with their kids, but don’t want to leave the theater. Or it could be good advertising, good word-of-mouth, good reviews, or other non-cynical reasons.

The film follows Charlie (Robert Pattinson) and Emma (Zendaya), a nauseatingly-cute Boston-area couple a week away from their wedding. He’s a bit of a creep and she doesn’t talk much about her military-family upbringing, but they’re sure they can learn to live with each other’s foibles, after all, they’re in love. Hopefully it’s not much of a spoiler to say that their love will be tested over the course of the film as they deal with, well, drama.

That drama first rears its head at a couples’ dinner with friends Mike (Mamoudou Athie) and Rachel (Alana Haim). Rachel has the bright idea to have everyone at the table reveal the worst thing they’ve ever done. I’m not sure what the “best” case scenario is for a game like this, but it certainly ends in one of the worst. Emma makes the grave miscalculation of thinking that she has the forum to be honest, and reveals a secret that ruins everybody’s night.

I joked about spoilers earlier, but when it comes to Emma’s secret, things are more difficult. Unlike traditional spoilers, this one comes early in the movie, when she and Charlie are still in their “honeymoon phase,” so to speak. Not revealing the secret makes it hard to look at the rest of the movie, but it’s in the movie’s best interest that the audience is taken off-guard so they don’t have time to form opinions about the controversial subject matter in advance.

What I can say is that once Emma’s secret is revealed, Charlie can’t look at her the same way again. He tries to put it out of his mind, but… if you’re told not to think of a red umbrella, you think of a red umbrella, and Emma’s secret might have involved some red umbrellas if people were carrying umbrellas. It is worth noting that Emma’s secret does not involve tangible victims or require tangible consequences. All it can do is affect how people think of her, which is invariably some form of “worse.”

Emma’s secret drives Charlie to madness in his relationship with his friends, his assistant (Hailey Gates), and especially Emma. Eventually his insecurities drive her crazy, and by the time of the wedding, they’re quite the dysfunctional couple. They’re talking about spending the rest of their lives together, but can the relationship even survive the reception? Let’s just say that there will probably be a lot fewer fantasies about getting married to Robert Pattinson after this movie.

“The Drama” really clicked with me, even though its appeal lies in a dark, awkward, cringey comedy that I don’t normally like. Probably the highlight of the film for me was a scene from the trailers, where Charlie and Emma try to pose for wedding photos like everything is okay when it definitely isn’t. It’s not hard to tell from the trailers that “something” is off, but the added context made it funnier than it ever was when being cryptic (though being cryptic was the right tone for the trailers). I recommend this film, but try to wear a beat-up shirt that you won’t mind stretching out from tugging at your collar.

Grade: B

“The Drama” is rated R for sexual content, some violent/bloody images, language throughout, and brief drug use. Its running time is 105 minutes.

Contact Bob Garver at rrg251@nyu.edu.

Perhaps the reason Keanu Reeves doesn’t quite grasp the tone in Jonah Hill’s Hollywood star in crisis over a scandal “comedy” “Outcome” is that director, co-writer and co-star Hill didn’t make what he was going for clear.

Maybe Hill didn’t quite know himself what notes to hit in a not-quite-funny romp through extortion, taking stock and making amends for the selfish lives stars must live to become movie stars. It doesn’t help that Reeves is a frustratingly awkward actor in any film that doesn’t have fight choreography, comedies and sensitive dramas or dramedies especially.

There are a couple of laughs in this picture, and a few poignant, almost “honest” moments provided by Martin Scorsese, who plays the talent manager who “discovered” the former child star Reef Hawk (Reeves), abandoned as Reef ascended to the pinnacle of Hollywood success,by Susan Lucci, as Reef’s estranged “Real Housewives” mother and Cameron Diaz as one of two high school friends (Matt Bomer is the other) who stuck with their 56 year old pal and got a posh free ride for their trouble.

But the picture doesn’t play, doesn’t send much of a message and most certainly never “lands.”

The title “Outcome” is a sophmoric pun, and in Hill’s antic “crisis lawyer” co-starring performance there are traces of every over-the-top comedy of his foul-mouthed cherub youth. As a bald, bearded David Cross-on-uppers lawyer who decorates his office with “client” photos of Kanye, the Clintons and Kevin Spacey, Hill’s Ira is forever trying misread-the-room “jokes” that he freely admits don’t “land.”

“I gotta go. Adam Driver bought a pet chimp and it ate some lady’s face off at the mall!”

Even the ones Ira doesn’t apologize for play as strained, with only Hill’s toothy, tasteless/tactless energy to put them over.

Reef, a former addict and all-around Hollywood “nice guy” is just about to end a five year hiatus from acting, kicking his heroin addiction and keeping much of that and a legion of people who apparently “hate” him — with cause — out of the public eye and unattached to his pristine image.

But the new landscape for celebrity has made him paranoid. “You’re always being watched, observed,” he fearfully grouses to Kyle (Diaz) and Xander (Bomer).

And now somebody has a video they’re threatening to release, something that could ruin Reef and his image. He compulsively Googles “Is Reef Hawk an ass—e,” “Reef Hawk scandal” and “Reef Hawk video,” waiting for a shoe to drop — which shoe, he has no idea.

Which is why fast-talking Ira sends him on an apology tour through his past — that first manager, his mother — who only meets with him in an interview for her “Housewives” show. Mom’s sense of victimhood, living through her wildly popular son’s rise having “sacrificed” and groomed him for stardom since childhood, is genuine and almost touching if not genuinely funny.

“Just because it’s performative doesn’t mean it’s not the TRUTH!”

Hill can’t find laughs in a meeting Ira stages with his crisis-management “team” — an Allred-ish abused women lawyer, a Rev. Al-ish civil rights pastor, an Asian rights advocate.

What? No Jewish anti-semitism minimizer?

“We ran the numbers. It turns out hating Jews doesn’t negatively impact a person’s career.”

David Spade pops up as a new Malibu neighbor whose very young, very pregnant wife (Kaia Gerber) lands the movie’s funniest line.

“I know you. You used to date my grandmother!”

Van Jones plays himself, an interviewer willing to be arm-twisted by the star insisting he be introduced as a (two time) “Oscar winner.” Drew Barrymore plays herself as an interviewer you maybe don’t want to screw with.

Soaking up the one-liners and Hill’s antic but comically winded patter makes one wonder if even recasting the lead would have helped.

But watching Reeves struggle with his alternately serious or faux dismayed reactions, a damaged soul with remorse for those he’s wronged but a human void that potential laughs spiral into to die is a burden this lightweight goof on the devolving nature of “fame” never overcomes.

Rating: R, profanity, a sexual situation

Cast: Keanu Reeves, Cameron Diaz, Jonah Hill, Susan Lucci, Matt Bomer, Ivy Wolf, David Spade, Martin Scorsese and Drew Barrymore

Credits: Directed by Jonah Hill, scripted by Jonah Hill and Exra Woods. An Apple TV+ release.

Running time: 1:24

Related