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Watching this movie was like watching one of those movies that don't know if they are a comedy or a drama but in this case, it's either a thriller or a melodrama, hence the melothriller.

It starts with a family moving to another army base where the dad is going to work on a secret nuclear project. As we watch him doing the big experiment we expect the techno-thriller twist in the style of Michael Chrichton or Stephen King, but instead, the movie turns into a Douglas Sirk melodrama. It goes on as a melodrama where Jessica Lange plays one of her typical roles of a woman on the border of a nervous breakdown. As she finally has her breakdown, the movie becomes soapy with great misunderstandings and bad people pulling the strings to destroy this suddenly great love story. As the last part ensues, the whole melodramatic buildup is dismissed as some B plot in a techno-thriller. So, the movie is neither thrilling nor melodramatic.

Why this movie sucks is very simple: you simply don't care about the characters. And even calling them characters seems too gracious because they are just sketches. You do get the feeling that Apatow loves these people privately so he figured that we will too love them and just enjoy their presence. I mean, one of the obvious indicators is when you have Fred Armisen on board because to me he is the epitome of "winging it" when you don't have any idea of what kind of movie you are making.

This brings in another issue. What is this movie even about? It is so superficial and impatient that it is hard to tell. It tries to be about the quarantine but it is so removed from what actual people went through that you can't take it seriously. Or is it about filmmaking? But the characters seem to be so disinterested in the movie that they are making, with tired jokes like when the prop guy wants the actor to read his screenplay.

You almost wish you were watching those cheese dinosaur movies that the characters are making instead because at least you know what these movies are about.

I finally watched this movie since it gets referenced a lot so I might see it already.

The movie is making some very dramatic buildup with interesting characters which tend to react too emotionally for it to be realistic, but ok, it's drama. But then wtf happened? The screenwriters gave up and used deus ex machina to resolve the main conflict and rush into a happy (Hollywood) ending.