Before receiving a cancer diagnosis, Michael spent the bulk of his time with his best friend, Andy (Ray Romano), doing puzzles, playing a squash-like game called “Paddleton,” and watching the same kung fu movie repeatedly. The diagnosis changes nothing and everything about their routine. The two men, who seem to have only each other, bristle at having to engage in small talk with anyone. And yet “Paddleton” is an aggressively gentle film.
Well, for a film about assisted suicide.
“Paddleton,” a Netflix original film, spends most of its time chronicling the aftermath of Michael’s diagnosis and his subsequent decision to end his life with Andy’s help. Alex Lehmann, who directed the movie, and Duplass, who wrote it with him, make a commendable effort in observing its characters’ tics in hyper-specific detail. So do Romano and Duplass, who as actors are clearly invested in trying to imbue this intimate friendship with a lived-in familiarity and mumbly warmth.
The pace is leisurely, the humor likable (until it proves a liability), and its two lead characters are illustrated with generous precision.
And yet for all that, the payoffs feel negligible. “Paddleton” is so keyed into its protagonists’ various idiosyncrasies that it seems hesitant to grapple with its own central tension. Too often, Andy’s anxiety about Michael’s situation is deflected with humor, which lands only like a pat on the back, never reveling in the absurdity.
In the end, the film takes too long to take itself seriously, and as such it struggles to deliver on its ostensible promise: that two weird men with a close bond will meaningfully confront death and its implications — to themselves and to their friendship. Previous writing-directing work by Duplass with his brother, Jay (“Jeff Who Lives at Home”), could be quietly devastating. “Paddleton” is mostly just quiet.
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“Paddleton” is not rated. Running time: 1 hour 29 minutes.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.