Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Will Ferrell are excellent.
Pulling this off, of course, requires performers that can execute these varied tonal notes and possess the timing to pull it all off, and the movie is stacked with pros led by Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Will Ferrell. The word “harrowing” is not used lightly above, as Louis-Dreyfus does a remarkable job pulling the audience into her emotional moment, and there really is an added power that comes from being so used to laughing when you see her on screen. It’s far from her lone great scene in the movie, though, as she both plays with the turmoil of the situation throughout the story, while also getting her funny beats in (including a humorous bit of physical comedy as she aims to get some private relief in a public bathroom following a heated exchange with a ski instructor).
