Social anxiety abounds in velvet-black British college reunion comedy All My Friends Hate Me, a seething sneer of a satire that swirls around angst-plagued Pete (Stourton), the milquetoast member of a group of friends who come together to celebrate his birthday. They’re all terrifically posh, all from money or doing something in the city, and Pete is not quite sure if he fits in. After all, he’s spent the last few years doing charity work in refugee camps (a point of inadvertent yet constant humble-brags), and in that time the tapestry of their friendship has inevitably become a little threadbare.
If that wasn’t enough tension then the script by Stourton and Tom Palmer ratchets up every second of discomfort. His supposed pals have summoned him out to a stately mansion for a weekend of cheer and throwback debauchery, but the constant jokes at his expense – many of them coming from strange interloper Harry (Demri-Burns) – make him wonder if he’s actually welcome, or if he’s been summoned under some ruse.
Director Andrew Gaynord cut his teeth in TV sitcoms, and the fact that he worked on Tim Robinson’s pre-I Think You Should Leave series Detroiters shows his willingness to indulge in grueling discomfort. But All My Friends Hate Me also fits into the grand English tradition of awkward weekend retreats, starting with P.G. Wodehouse, through Peter’s Friends (the cinematic launching pad for Stephen Fry, Kenneth Branagh, Hugh Laurie, Imelda Staunton, and Emma Thompson), and most recently in the bleakly tragic enviro-tragedy Silent Night. It’s the British equivalent of the high school reunion movie, shaken up with some cabin-in-the-woods sealed bottle pressure through the manor house location, and much of the effectiveness here comes from Stourton. He makes Pete a surprised yelp in human form, hoovering up his “herbal stress pills” to stop himself from teetering into full paranoid delusion.
But that’s where Stourton and Palmer’s script is most fascinating. It’s not simply a matter of working out whether it’s all in Pete’s head or not. Instead, there’s a surprisingly elegant conversation about old friendships and the moments that define our personalities and relationships, all wrapped up in that piercing, cynical yet compassionate comedy. Just because they’re not out to get you, All My Friends Hate Me winks, doesn’t mean they’re not awful.
This article appears in March 18 • 2022.
