Life of the Party

New Line Cinema | Release Date: May 11, 2018

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

46	METASCORE Mixed or average reviews based on 32 Critics

Positive:

Mixed:

Negative:

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Critic Reviews

Critic score Publication By date

New York PostSara StewartMay 10, 2018

Life of the Party is undeniably at its best when Falcone is showcasing McCarthy’s aptitude for physical comedy. Read full review

Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperMay 10, 2018

I’m giving Life of the Party three stars — a solid B, if you will — on the strength of at least a half-dozen laugh-out-loud moments, some truly sharp dialogue, a tremendously likable cast, and the sheer force of its cheerful goofiness. Read full review

Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattMay 10, 2018

A charming and generally painless way to spend two hours. It’s not nearly as sharp as some of the best stuff she’s done, but it’s pointedly kinder too, wrapping even its nastiest characters. Read full review

Los Angeles TimesGlenn WhippMay 10, 2018

To complain that nothing much happens here or ponder the film's curiously tame view of university life (Rodney Dangerfield would most definitely get no respect here) is to miss the point of the movie, which is to serve as a vehicle for McCarthy, spotlighting her warm, screwball spirit and irrepressible physical comedy. Read full review

VarietyAmy NicholsonMay 10, 2018

This is a heartier celebration of McCarthy’s talents, a mash note to a comic who can also play flirtatious, empathetic, and human. She’s believable, even if the scenes setting-off her performance aren’t. Read full review

The AtlanticChristopher OrrMay 12, 2018

While McCarthy does what she can with the material provided her, it’s not nearly enough to save the movie. As a result, Life of the Party doesn’t live up to either of the nouns in its title. Read full review

Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsMay 10, 2018

The movie’s not as slapstick-dependent as advertised. It’s a less coarse and more heartfelt project than McCarthy’s disappointing headliner gigs, such as “Tammy” and “The Boss.” (The Paul Feig-directed comedies “Bridesmaids,” “The Heat” and “Spy” are far better.) The new movie renders matters of directorial finesse and comic technique essentially irrelevant. Read full review

The Seattle TimesMoira MacdonaldMay 10, 2018

It’s bland and forgettable, and director Falcone still hasn’t figured out how not to sabotage his supporting cast (why hire the hilarious Chris Parnell if you’re not going to let him be funny?), but it’s a movie a lot like the presence of McCarthy herself — there’s an inner sweetness that shines through. Read full review

The A.V. ClubJesse HassengerMay 10, 2018

The movie portrays Deanna’s rediscovery of a pre-mom life, and how she squares that freedom with her identity as a loving mother, with a lot of warmth, and its refusal to gin up tired conflicts or mawkish lessons is admirable. That does, however, leave Life Of The Party without much comic momentum. Read full review

UproxxVince ManciniMay 10, 2018

In hitting so many bullet points from the boardroom presentation justifying its existence, it’s a wonder that Life of the Party manages to work in anything personal or natural at all. And it does, which is a testament to the talent of the people involved (McCarthy, Gillian Jacobs, and Maya Rudolph especially). I just wish I could see them in a movie that wasn’t trying to be everything to everyone. Read full review

The PlaylistLena WilsonMay 10, 2018

Maybe if the film had dwelled on its more off-color scenes instead of falling back on typical comedy fodder, it would be truly magnetic. Unfortunately, it’s more like a sloppy friend who, despite starting the night off full of joie de vivre, you now have to help stumble home. Read full review

The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Brad WheelerMay 11, 2018

A truly gifted comedic actress, McCarthy is wasting her talents with this vanilla-flavoured story. Read full review

RogerEbert.comMatt Zoller SeitzMay 11, 2018

So preoccupied with giving its star's wish fulfillment fantasies that it forgets to make sure all the other major characters seem like characters, rather than underdeveloped notions. Read full review

Philadelphia Daily NewsGary ThompsonMay 10, 2018

Half the movie has a game McCarthy starring in scenes that live up to the promise of the movie’s title (’80s dance off! Bust a move!), and yet there are major plot points built around this same woman’s fear of public speaking. It has you longing for the narrative consistency of Rodney Dangerfield’s Back to School. Read full review

The New York TimesA.O. ScottMay 10, 2018

The zaniness is pretty low-key, and what we witness is less the explosion of pent-up energy than the gentle affirmation of exuberant kindness. Read full review

USA TodayBrian TruittMay 10, 2018

It borrows from "Animal House," "Back to School," "Old School" and other superior films, leaning less into crudeness and more into female-centric laughs, but offers some sweet moments and a few enjoyably zany characters. Read full review

St. Louis Post-DispatchCalvin WilsonMay 10, 2018

Working from a screenplay that he co-wrote with McCarthy, director Ben Falcone (who happens to be her husband) keeps things moving but without much of a spark. Read full review

San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMay 10, 2018

Life of the Party presents a situation more than a story, and in that it’s more like a sitcom than a conventional movie. Read full review

Slant MagazineEric HendersonMay 10, 2018

Novelty and Melissa McCarthy’s comedic chops only carry Life of the Party to midterms, and it soon becomes apparent that it’s a star vehicle without any engine. Read full review

The Hollywood ReporterCaryn JamesMay 10, 2018

The film is a cream puff about a mother-daughter relationship, masquerading as a raucous return-to-campus comedy, most of it predictable. Read full review

Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzMay 10, 2018

It’s a movie devoid of storytelling momentum, conflict and, worst of all, much in the way of laughs. Read full review

Boston GlobeTom RussoMay 9, 2018

Thoroughly vanilla comedy, a movie jammed with well-meaning girl power messages but surprisingly little edge. Read full review

IndieWireJude DryMay 11, 2018

Life of the Party is proof that even the funniest actors need good material, which makes it all the more disappointing that McCarthy wrote the script with director Ben Falcone, who is also her husband. Read full review

Consequence of SoundBlake GobleMay 10, 2018

Life of the Party exists in one of those unfortunate places where it’s easy to criticize, but McCarthy still makes you smile, and even laugh. Read full review

Rolling StonePeter TraversMay 11, 2018

McCarthy falls into the same trap she did in "Tammy" and "The Boss," the two other movies she wrote with her husband/director Ben Falcone. By that we mean she allows her laugh instincts to get buried in a blanket of bland. Read full review

Movie NationRoger MooreMay 10, 2018

Falcone’s latest, Life of the Party, is death itself...There’s nobody there to push her, nobody on set with the power and emotional remove to tell McCarthy that they need another take, they need funnier lines, or that her halting line-readings do no make the unfunny script funny. Read full review

TheWrapRobert AbeleMay 10, 2018

Whatever Life of the Party needs its star to be, it gives us — frumpy, hot, weird, normal, kind, mean, humiliated, heroic, limber, uncoordinated, sexy, unsexy — in the desperate hope that you’ll latch on to some nugget of McCarthy-patented brazenness and you’ll laugh, as if story and cohesion meant nothing. Read full review

ReelViewsJames BerardinelliMay 11, 2018

This is not only the least funny movie in which McCarthy has appeared but the tamest and most toothless. Read full review

The Associated PressMark KennedyMay 10, 2018

Wandering aimlessly in the well-worn corridors of 1980s puerile frat flicks, Life of the Party wobbles to a predictable end and then sort of finishes without a bang. Read full review

Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerMay 11, 2018

Deanna is so irksome that even McCarthy seems to tire of her, and her bumbling, burbling, shy but gregarious persona is often discarded – not as a sign of character development, but because it would get in the way of a gag. Read full review

The GuardianBenjamin LeeMay 10, 2018

Life of the Party’s predictable and lethargic box-ticking of scenes (accidentally getting high – check; dance off – check), gives it the unremarkable stench of something you’ve half-watched on cable before. Read full review

Washington PostMichael O'SullivanMay 10, 2018

A largely laugh-free exercise in cliche. Read full review