This review is not appropriate for kids.
Unfinished Business is one of those movies that reminds you how hard it is to make movies. After all, there’s almost two whole hours to fill! Plus all those characters who have to say things—possibly even funny things! On top of that, it all needs to make sense! Making sense is hard.
In fairness, it’s not that Unfinished Business is never funny and never coherent. It’s just that it’s rarely those things.
When we first meet mineral salesman Dan Trunkman (Vince Vaughn), he’s getting his salary docked by his boss Chuck (the suddenly inescapable Sienna Miller). In a rare moment of boldness, he quits his job, vowing to start his own rival company, and encourages anyone on the sales team to join his revolt. In the parking lot, he’s thrilled to see that two people have followed him, both toting boxes filled with their office belongings. But it’s not quite what he had in mind: Sad-sack Timothy (Tom Wilkinson) was merely leaving because he had just been forced into early retirement. Simpleton Mike Pancake (Dave Franco) had only been there for a job interview.
“Why did you bring a box with your things to an interview?” Dan asks him.
“I wanted to show confidence that I’d get the job,” Mike replies.
(Okay, that was one of the few jokes that landed. On the other hand, the filmmakers seem to think that the last name “Pancake” is a comedy wellspring into which they should liberally dip.)
Despite Dan’s enthusiasm, we cut to a year and a half later and the three men are still working out of a Dunkin Donuts and have not landed a single meaningful client. In reality, they’d all be on the unemployment line by now, but somehow not only do they have enough money to stay afloat, they have enough money to travel to Portland (and then Germany) to finalize a business deal with the global company, The Benjaminson Group.
At home, things aren’t much better. Dan’s son is overweight and bullied at school. Conversely, his younger daughter is becoming a bully. Dan and his wife (June Diane Raphael) think that the answer to their children’s woes is private school. Way to throw money (that you don’t have) at a problem, Mom and Dad!
Of course, things don’t go as planned in Portland. Turns out, the deal isn’t finalized after all. Dan’s old nemesis Chuck is sleeping with Jim (James Marsden) one of the Benjaminson Group’s higher ups— and now she would appear to have the edge. Since the company is headquartered in Germany, Dan decides to fly the gang there, to make his pitch straight to its president.
On the trip, we find out a few things about Dan’s cohorts: Timothy is married to a woman he no longer loves, whom he describes as—wait for it—looking like a “vending machine.” He also feels sexually unsatisfied and really wants to do the “wheelbarrow” with a beautiful woman. Mike, a virgin, is baffled about the logistics of the wheelbarrow. He, too, wants to have sex on the business trip.
Anyway, the gang arrives in Berlin during a very busy time. There’s a G8 Summit, Oktoberfest, the Berlin marathon, and a gay fetish festival of some sort (red flag! red flag!). Due to some misunderstanding, Dan isn’t staying at a hotel or a hostel, but in a glass-enclosed art installation where he is “Business Man No. 47” and gawkers can watch his every move. Germans, amirite?
Weird things happen. The boys track down Jim’s right hand man Bill (Nick Frost) to a bathroom at a gay bar, where he is, yes, availing himself of a glory hole. This leads to the inevitable “Oh gross, I touched a penis” gay panic jokes. But that’s not even the weirdest part of this little sojourn. Bill tells Dan all about his sad life as a middle-aged, pear-shaped gay man. I honestly have no idea what this has to do with anything, except for the fact that if you’re going to put the great Nick Frost in your movie, you may as well use him. Also, later Dan encourages Bill to defy his bosses and act in a fashion consistent with the, um, size of his manhood. (It should be noted that Bill doesn’t do anything to help himself—he merely sneaks Dan and his team in to see the big boss.)
Unfinished Business, which is directed by Ken Scott and written by Steve Conrad (The Secret Life of Walter Mitty), feels busy and sweaty and a little desperate. I guess it’s supposed to be about male empowerment. Dan runs that convenient Berlin marathon (the film weaves in some half-baked story about how Dan once didn’t finish a marathon as a metaphor for him doing things halfway). Timothy leaves his wife and finds a woman who will do the wheelbarrow with him. Bill finds the cojones to…risk his own job to help Dan out. Mike has sex, several times, and becomes a man. (You’ll be happy to know that he, too, figures out the wheelbarrow . . .Yay?) I, for one, would like to see the sequel: The Vending Machine’s Revenge.