Queenpins Review: A Good Bargain Comedy

Release date: September 10, 2021
Running time: 111 minutes
Directed By: Aron Gaudet & Gita Pullapilly
Starring: Kristen Bell, Kirby Howell - Baptiste, Paul Walter Hauser, Joel McHale, Bebe Rexha, Vince Vaughn

Inspired by a true story, QUEENPINS is an outrageous comedy about a bored and frustrated suburban homemaker, Connie (Kristen Bell) and her best pal JoJo (Kirby Howell-Baptiste), a vlogger with dreams, who turn a hobby into a multi-million dollar counterfeit coupon caper. After firing off a letter to the conglomerate behind a box of cereal gone stale, and receiving an apology along with dozens of freebies, the duo hatch an illegal coupon club scheme that scams millions from mega-corporations and delivers deals to legions of fellow coupon clippers. On the trail to total coupon dominance, a hapless Loss Prevention Officer (Paul Walter Hauser) from the local supermarket chain joins forces with a determined U.S. Postal Inspector (Vince Vaughn) in hot pursuit of these newly-minted “Queenpins” of pink collar crime.

Queenpins is all about the characters and thankfully the film has some entertaining ones.  Kristen Bell is her usual very perky self, playing an obnoxiously optimistic ringleader in this coupon scam.  Kirby Howell-Baptiste is an enjoyable friend for Connie (Bell) and her energy and sales acumen help get this going.  And the pair have some good chemistry on screen as well; they feed off each other and make for some enjoyable sequences.  The other pair in this film are the unlikely duo of Vince Vaughn and Paul Walter Hauser as the agents tracking down the Queenpins.  They have very different personalities with Hauser playing an aggressively socially awkward character and Vaughn playing an unusually serious character that only Vaughn can.  But together, these unlikely pairs form the entertainment and core of this film.  

The story of Queenpins goes from normal to crazy, with the extreme couponers going to further and further lengths to try and hide the profit that they are making.  They make fake bank accounts, launder the money, and go to extremes all in the name of their business.  And these scenes were entertaining, like a couponing ballers, but overall the story just felt slow.  Despite the crazy story and situation, it definitely feels like not a lot is happening.  The movie feels like a long 111 minutes, and I'm not exactly sure why.  I think the main issue is that the story is enjoyable, but not intensely interesting.  The filmmakers tried to add some extra motivation to the characters to try and humanize Connie and JoJo, as well as insert some Robinhood type mentalities to them, but in the end I just was not as invested in the characters.  Additionally, the film is "inspired" by a true story, and it seems like many liberties were taken with the story.  The original ring had different members and not as much craziness, although some of the facts did make it into the film.  And this results of that coupon ring were very different than what occurred in this film.  I'm not sure if keeping it closer to the original story would have helped but I don't love the "inspired by" moniker on movies.

Queenpins is not a discount film, with its crazy characters and extreme couponing story, but the slow pace makes this film an offer you can wait to stream.

Rent it.

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Queenpins is in theaters on September 10, 2021 and on Paramount+ on September 30, 2021.  For showtimes, click here.

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