The Drama Reviews: Critics Are Divided Over 'Uncomfortable' Film

While the secret at the centre of Zendaya and Robert Pattinson’s new film The Drama was kept under wraps in the lead-up to the movie’s release, it’s already sparked controversy and backlash from some critics.

The Drama centres around a seemingly happy young couple gearing up for their wedding day, only to wind up questioning everything when an innocent drinking game leads to a revelation that causes them to unravel.

Days before its release, critics began having their say on the film, and true to form, response has been decidedly split right down the middle.

Some more impressed critics have lauded it with five- and four-star reviews, while others have suggested it falls short of expectations laid out by its trailer.

One thing both its fans and detractors and can agree on, though, is that The Drama makes for some seriously “uncomfortable”, “unnerving”, “cringe-out-loud” and, often, “feel-bad” viewing.

Here’s what critics are saying about the film so far…

The Times (5/5)

“The wedding from hell is an enduring rom-com staple and dutifully deployed in everything from The Philadelphia Story to Four Weddings And A Funeral to Bride Wars. Yet a nuptial apocalypse has rarely been explored with such dark intelligence and mordant wit as in this often piercing and cringe-out-loud dramedy starring Robert Pattinson and Zendaya.”

The Independent (4/5) 

“No other film this year will make you feel as uncomfortable as The Drama. Don’t miss out on it.

“It’s provocative and compulsively watchable – a rom-com that obliterates the very meaning of the word, by thrusting love under the psychoanalyst’s microscope and tearing laughter by force from its viewers’ throats.”

Deadline

“[The Drama presents] a fascinating conundrum that sets off the fireworks in this darkly funny, yet explosively honest movie that may not be what you expect at all going in, but one that is bound to spark spirited conversation when you are walking out.”

Empire (4/5) 

“The drama of The Drama is visible in every uncomfortable stutter, every moment of avoided eye contact, every back turned instead of consolation offered. [...] Zendaya and Pattinson both thrive in this environment, relishing the kind of dialogue exchanges you want to watch through your fingers [...] As dark as it gets, it is often hilarious in that cruel, keen way that Borgli has proved to be a specialist.”

The Guardian (4/5) 

“The Drama has the spiky, ingenious, tasteless style of [director Kristoffer Borgli’s] previous film Dream Scenario, and both are superior to his unsubtle narcissism comedy Sick Of Myself.

“It offers us a provocation, a jeu d’ésprit of outrage, a psychological meltdown that is more astutely articulated than in many another more solemnly intended film. And it gives us what it promises in the title.”

The Hollywood Reporter

“[The Drama promises] an edgy, provocative look at how a relationship might weather the intrusion of a distinctly American pathology. In disappointing reality, though, the film is merely a differently dressed rehash of very familiar material.

“It’s a deceptively simple dramedy of cold feet, of pre-wedding jitters, only given the stain of higher-minded, more piercing social inquiry.”

IndieWire (B)

“Robert Pattinson and Zendaya redefine the modern American love story in a rom-com that’s almost as fucked up as America itself [...] The Drama is, by design, too unsettled for clarity, let alone social instruction.”

Variety

“Borgli is a gifted filmmaker, but in The Drama he never stops jumping around – back in time, and also within scenes, all to hook us into a note of toxic anxiety.

“He succeeds, but the mix of tones is unnerving and, at times, a bit baffling. Are we supposed to be cracking up, or sucking in our breath as the hero’s sanity cracks?”

The Telegraph (2/5) 

“The Drama promises bombshell revelations and the wedding from hell, but serves up a cramped, feel-bad, unromantic comedy with characters we don’t care about.”

RogerEbert.com (1.5/4) 

“[The Drama] actually wants viewers to connect with its two stars. It hopes to humanise them as complex people meant for one another and to demonise those critical of them as self-righteous hypocrites. But what gives this glib, circuitous film the right to persecute the apathetic when it barely understands its own characters?”