Tribeca 2022: Employee of the Month Review

This will be one of several reviews from this year’s Tribeca film Festival. To follow our coverage, click here.

Oddball dark comedies are a fun subgenre, giving audiences one or more characters to rally around as they are often faced with precarious situations. The fun comes from how they get themselves out of it as those journeys have plenty of ups and downs for the most part. But that only happens if that connection is there. Office bureaucracy is ripe for such a subgenre. When it comes to Employee of the Month, this oddball dark comedy takes audiences on a journey over the course of its short running time of just under 80 minutes. Such a short running time can either be a positive or negative depending on how a film makes use of it. In this case, the filmmakers keep its admittedly ridiculous story moving and doesn’t wear out its welcome. However, don’t expect much in the way of depth as it attempts to get its point across through its over-the-top nature. Underneath all that ridiculousness is a surprising amount of heart and much of that credit belongs to a superb lead performance from Jasmina Douieb.

Employee of the Month follows a middle-aged woman named Inès (Douieb) who has devoted a large portion of her life working as a model employee for a cleaning company that has marginalized her and her efforts as her fellow arguably sexist and misogynist coworkers received promotions and raises. It was inevitable but something was going to give and perhaps the arrival of a new trainee named Mélody (Mampaka) was it. Inspired to finally stand up for herself and for her boss Patrick (Van den Begin), the situation quickly got out of control, leaving Ines and Melody to salvage things and avoid getting caught. Considering their comically dimwitted coworkers, that outcome seemed highly unlikely. That being said, watching them mind their generation gap and work together in order to survive was fun to watch. Meanwhile, the other big angle was hints of female empowerment though when contrasted with those aforementioned dimwitted coworkers, that angle kind of rang hollow.

The best part of Employee of the Month was the performances of Douieb and Mampaka as Ines and Melody and their great chemistry as women on opposite stages in their lives. They were an absolute blast to watch together. Douieb was the undisputed heart of the film as a powder keg of repressed frustration that got to let it all out which was ultimately satisfying. Mampaka was also a scene-stealer at times.

In the end, Employee of the Month was a nice surprise offering a quick entertaining watch.

still courtesy of Tribeca

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.