THE STORY – Two sisters with a contentious relationship decide to rob a rural home in upstate New York. The simple robbery turns into a nightmare when one of them throws out her back and becomes immobilized on the second floor. The night spirals out of control as they embark on a painful journey to leave before the homeowner returns.
THE CAST – Lizzy Caplan, Lucy DeVito, John Stamos & Christine Ko
THE TEAM – Raviv Ullman & Greg Yagolnitzer (Directors/Writers)
THE RUNNING TIME – 86 Minutes
God bless B-movies. Who needs big-budget blockbusters when you can get something short, self-contained, and thrilling in a completely original package? In a world of high concepts and IP brand extensions, more films should be like Raviv Ullman and Greg Yagolnitzer’s “Drag,” a comedic heist movie with a simple twist: One of the thieves throws out their back and needs to be dragged out of the house by the other before the person they’re robbing gets back home. If that sounds more like the premise of a “Saturday Night Live” sketch than a full-length feature film, well, that’s not far from the truth. While “Drag” is a wild, unexpected ride, it definitely feels like it’s stretching itself pretty thin to get to that 86-minute runtime.
The plot is so schematic that the characters don’t even have names, except for our lead, who’s listed in the credits as Fuckup (Lizzy Caplan). Fuckup has dragged her sister (Lucy DeVito) with her out into the woods in the dark of night to be a lookout while she breaks into a remote house. She says the man owes her money, so she’s just stealing back enough to get what she’s owed, but Sister seems unconvinced. It doesn’t take long for things to go horribly wrong: A pained scream rings out into the night, causing Sister to go after Fuckup against her better judgment. She finds Fuckup on her back in the master bathroom’s tub, unable to move without great pain.
The sisterly bickering between Caplan and DeVito grates at first, as we’re thrown into their sniping without much context. The opening scene, despite some funny moments, is rough going, especially since both Fuckup and Sister come across as unlikable in different ways. Fuckup may live up to her name, but Sister looks down on her, believing that her life with a steady job and a family is inherently better than whatever Fuckup has going on. As soon as both sisters are in the house, though, things get significantly better. Not only does the dialogue become more pointed (and thus, funnier), but the screenplay keeps finding interesting, hilarious angles to the situation. Anyone who has thrown their back out (and I count myself as among them) knows it’s a pain, making it almost impossible to function. Caplan has a meal out of expressing that pain through each new indignity visited upon her body.
After going through a gauntlet of bodily harm to get downstairs, Sister and Fuckup learn they are out of time: The owner of the house (John Stamos), an artist with odd tastes, has returned earlier than expected. And what’s more, he’s closely followed by a date (Christine Ko) who passes out while he sketches a portrait of her. It’s clear he drugged her, putting Fuckup and Sister in an even tougher situation: Can they not only save themselves, but this poor girl, too? This is when the film finally starts to drag in its pacing. After getting so invested in the sisters’ plight, it’s hard to leave them for such long stretches while focusing on two new characters. These scenes are well-written and carry a lot of tension because of how close they come to discovering the sisters, but they mostly work because of Stamos. The actor has always had a dangerous quality to his screen presence that has gone underutilized, but he leans into it here, delivering an unhinged performance that steals the movie. Weaponizing that devilish grin, dancing with abandon, and monologuing as if his life depended on it, Stamos is clearly having a blast letting loose in a way he hasn’t gotten the chance to do before. He’s electric, energizing the film whenever he’s onscreen.
Fun as Stamos is, though, more time spent with him means less time spent with Caplan, one of the most engaging screen presences in film. She’s absolutely fantastic, giving a full arc to Fuckup’s pain that Ullman and Yagolnitzer heighten with some fun camera tricks and smart editing choices. Given the amount of pain she’s in, Fuckup moves more and more slowly throughout the film. When it’s finally time for her to stand and fight, the directors capture it in all its agonizingly slow-moving glory, stretching out the tension like a rubber band until it snaps. The filmmaking is engineered for crowd-pleasing moments throughout, and even though the film’s overall pacing can be wobbly, those individual moments work a treat. “Drag” may be a thin premise to hang a whole film on, and despite the personality of the performers, the characters themselves are too generic, but it’s never a drag to watch.
