Friended to Death

The story’s message may not be the most original one in the world — put down your device and make eye contact — but it’s fun to watch it unfold in a world that, while far from realistic, feels real enough.

This plays like a live-action cartoon where you root for nobody. Everyone seems to think that yelling their lines will make the dialogue funnier. It doesn’t.

Only during the movie's sweet epilogue do we get a sense of what Friended could have been had the filmmakers taken a smarter, gentler, more human approach.

You can sense the director, Sarah Smick, gearing up to make a point. It proves rather obvious: Real connections are meaningful and too much Facebook is bad. But isn't the real problem more insidious?

Constant close-ups give the sense that the movie itself is violating viewers’ personal space, while an earnest moral suggests that online communication can’t substitute for face-to-face interaction: a topic Friended to Death doesn’t seem to know much about.

Michael (Hansen) fakes his death and announces it online, solely so he can see who shows up at his funeral. His plans only grow more dimwitted from there.

It’s a wafer-thin, poorly plotted, insufferable comedy about a jerky guy who’s swapped actual human interaction for Facebook likes. People like this exist, and their stories should be told, but it would be wise to scroll past this version.