Melissa McCarthy is a dexterous verbal and physical comedian whose frenetic tenacity only grows stronger with each new film. While she merely elevated good movies like “This Is 40” and “Bridesmaids” with her tear-generating rants, McCarthy is perhaps more impressive in “Heat,” where she carries Sandra Bullock, and “Identity Thief,” where she carries Jason Bateman. Those are not great films but you have to respect her effort, lifting the content from deeply mediocre to watchable.
And so we arrive at “The Boss.” McCarthy is Michelle Darnell, an orphan turned successful entrepreneuse. The narrative commences at Michelle’s apex, where she sells out a basketball arena for some pull-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps speechifying. But, before she can demagogue her way to sufficient riches to be a presumptive presidential nominee, she’s sent to jail for insider trading and loses her fortune.
After her release, Michelle goes couch surfing in the apartment of her former assistant Claire (Kristen Bell) and Claire’s daughter, Rachel (Ella Anderson). The guest doles out unsolicited advice and consumes snacks - most amusingly a treat she pronounces “Do-ri-to.”
Indeed, comestibles are the heart of the film. After Michelle accompanies Rachel to a Dandelions meeting (they share the pastel colors and sanctimoniousness of Girl Scouts), she decides to leverage Claire’s delicious homemade brownies into a competitor. Finding the Dandelions an insufficient lesson in top-down American economics, Michelle schemes up Darnell’s Darlings with the sage understanding that cold hard cash will always be a more meaningful motivation for kids than community service. She recruits girls from the wrong side of the tracks to join her raspberry-bereted strike force and they engage in fun, “Anchorman”-inspired skirmishes with the Dandelions.
As always, when McCarthy sinks her teeth into someone it gets very funny. Michelle heaps well-meaning abuse on Claire: “You dress like you grocery shop at CVS.” Acutely concerned with the slackness of her friend’s brassiere strap she hisses, “You’re gonna zip a nipple.”
It’s a regrettable genre necessity for Michelle’s heart to grow three sizes and that she find the family she’s never had, etc., etc. Thus, when the Darlings are threatened by an old enemy of Michelle’s, Renault (Peter Dinklage, with a hairstyle so heinous it ought to end the man-bum phenomenon for good), she makes the unsound business decision to fight him. “The Boss” is well out of ideas by the ending, which involves more swordplay than you’d figure in a comedy about baked goods.
Given the indifferent direction of Ben Falcone, it seems logical that the most talented person on the project should run the whole show. One hopes McCarthy might soon write, star and direct her own pictures - one also hopes that the results are more Charlie Chaplin than Ben Stiller.
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“The Boss” is showing at the Sonoma 9 Cinemas. Rated R. Running time 1:39. Visit cinemawest.com.
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