In a film with obvious ambition, though, it’s a shame that it resorts to formula so quickly.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
Slant Magazine by Andrew Schenker
Much of the film's attempted laughs come from the comedy-of-discomfort school, with an endless array of situations that milk awkwardness to a degree that makes these scenes far more unpleasant than humorous to watch.
I Give It a Year groans on, with unmemorable scene after unmemorable scene, each one more contingent on coincidence and happenstance than by the actual, gear-filled mechanics of drama or comedy.
If the emotional mathematics don’t quite add up, enough diversion is provided by pic’s broader comic setpieces to paper over the cracks.
The default middle ground between true-to-life and wacky in I Give It A Year turns out to be a place of dreary artificiality.
The jokes are strong and delivered by a very talented cast, but the heart isn’t there. It’s easy to laugh, but hard to care.
The Guardian by Peter Bradshaw
The result is funny and plausible, with a fair bit of newly modish Bridesmaidsy bad taste, though I kept getting the sense that the romcom template meant Mazer couldn't really let rip with pure comedy pessimism and cynicism in the way he might have liked.
The Telegraph by Robbie Collin
In the end it amounts to not much, but in the moment I laughed a lot.
The beats and trappings are all standard-issue, but the gags are funny enough, often enough, to offset such routine proceedings.