Film

Joshy

Name: Joshy
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Released: 2016
Cast: Thomas Middleditch, Adam Pally, Alex Ross Perry, Nick Kroll, Jenny Slate

Drama

A fractured comedy-drama about a guy processing his cancelled wedding through a weekend in Ojai with friends who'd rather do drugs and avoid real conversation. It's awkward, tender, and deeply committed to the principle that sometimes the funniest thing is watching people fail to be decent to each other. For anyone who's laughed at pain, or cringed at their own inability to help someone hurting.

TMDb rating

2.8

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like comedy that stays with an awkward, sad man while his friends fumble around him, where the laughs come from people failing to say the obvious thing.

Skip it if you need your comedies brisk and your characters likable, since this one lingers in its hangouts, and its friends are often hard to spend a whole weekend with.

What it asks of you: It runs about ninety-three minutes but feels looser than that, mostly talk and drift, with its sadness arriving sideways rather than in big scenes you can count on.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

The Overnight2015

Another Middleditch ensemble comedy about adult friendships and sex that's uncomfortable, smart, and genuinely funny without punching down. Adam Scott and Jason Schwartzman are fantastic.

But The premise is deliberately awkward sexual stuff, which some people find more cringey than cathartic. It's also unmistakably indie in pacing.

Drinking Buddies2013

Joe Swanberg captures the messiness of how friends actually navigate attraction and obligation. Olivia Wilde and Jake Johnson have wonderful chemistry, and the film trusts you to sit with unresolved feelings.

But It's slow and circular. If you want closure or clear character arcs, you'll feel frustrated. Deliberately so.

High Fidelity2000

John Cusack's record-store guy processes heartbreak by ranking exes and examining his own failures. It's funny, sad, and honest about how self-absorption masquerades as self-awareness, which is exactly Joshy's engine.

But It's dated in some registers, and the voiceover can feel mannered. The film assumes you'll forgive the protagonist some pretty selfish behaviour.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Joshy

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Leaving Las Vegas1995

Both films refuse to look away from a man's inability to be rescued by his friends, or to rescue himself. The difference is that Joshy finds this darkly funny. This one finds it devastating.

Nicolas Cage's unsparing portrait of addiction and abandonment. Like Joshy, it watches a man in crisis surrounded by people who cannot or will not help. But where Joshy is dark comedy, this is tragedy without relief—raw, necessary, unforgettable.

But It's genuinely difficult to watch. Graphic, depressing, and offers no catharsis or redemption. This is for when you want cinema to hurt.

Broad City2014

It shares Joshy's commitment to showing friendship as chaotic and self-interested, but with genuine affection underneath. Jenny Slate appears here too, and the ensemble comic timing is exceptional.

But Five seasons is a commitment, and the show gets weirder and more surreal as it goes. Early seasons are sharper than later ones.

Togetherness2015

Mark Duplass's HBO series about married couples and their friends trying to figure out how to live and love. It's tender, awkward, and deeply invested in whether people can actually be present for each other.

But It was cancelled after two seasons and doesn't resolve much. The emotional intensity can feel relentless if you're not in the mood for vulnerability.

Girls2012

Lena Dunham's ensemble about friends failing each other in specific, recognizable ways. Like Joshy, it refuses to let anyone off the hook or pretend that good intentions matter if you're not actually showing up.

But It's fundamentally pessimistic about people, which can feel punishing. Also, some of the behaviour is intentionally ugly.

The Good Guys

Colin Farrell and Woody Harrelson as incompatible partners trying to solve a crime. It's lighter than Joshy but has the same interest in how people hurt each other while attempting to connect.

But The plot is secondary to character, which some viewers find meandering. It's also aggressively crude.

Neighbors2014

Seth Rogen and Zac Efron in a comedy about men who can't grow up or be honest about what they want. It's got the same undertone of sadness beneath the jokes that Joshy carries.

But It's far broader and more conventional than Joshy. If you want something subtle, this isn't it.

Magnolia1999

Both films are structured around a weekend or short span where emotional truth is supposed to happen but largely doesn't. Both find comedy and tragedy in that gap. Magnolia scales it to mythic proportions.

Paul Thomas Anderson's three-hour ensemble about men and women failing to connect despite desperate proximity. It's operatic where Joshy is intimate, but both explore the architecture of male friendships and the terror of honesty.

But It's exhausting—long, ambitious, and emotionally demanding. The frogs might seem ridiculous. It doesn't believe in easy answers and neither will you by the end.

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King2003

Like Joshy, it's about men incapable of articulating what they need from each other, watching small moments carry the weight of everything unsaid. But where Joshy uses comedy to cope with that silence, this film uses silence itself—a completely different register.

Andrei Zvyagintsev's Russian masterpiece: a father returns after years of absence and takes his two sons on a mysterious journey. It's about masculine silence, failure, and the unbridgeable distance between father and sons, told in perfect, patient frames.

But It's a slow film in Russian with minimal dialogue. No humor at all. If you need plot momentum or emotional catharsis, you'll feel lost. Requires genuine patience.