TIFF 2025: Adulthood Review

This will be one of many reviews during this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, to keep up with our latest coverage, click here.

Sibling dysfunction has proven to be fertile ground for comedy, playing off the contrast in personalities for laughs through a particular adversity. After watching so many films go back to that well time and time again, the one vital element across the better offerings is the chemistry of said siblings, to bring the dynamic to life. In the case of Adulthood, a simple yet effective dark crime comedy, Josh Gad and Kaya Scodelario make it work and fun to watch. While the humor may be hit or miss and the story may be a bit predictable, it is certainly not the worst way to spend 90 or so minutes. Though its premise arguably does not jump out on paper, what will rally audiences towards the film is its cast, in addition to Gad and Scodelario. Billie Lourd and Anthony Carrigan, just to name a few, compliment the chaos nicely as the story finds itself spiralling in a decently entertaining way. That story sees Meg (Scodelario) and Noah (Gad) Robles return home to tend to their ailing mother Judy (Ingunn Omholt). Hospitalized following a stroke, the brother and sister decide to go through the mounds of stuff in their childhood home, making a shocking discovery tucked away behind a basement wall. With no one else to rely on but themselves, it was up to Meg and Noah to somehow get rid of what they found before it was too late. However, that task was more than they bargained for as hijinks would ensure from there.

Far out of their element, the deeper Meg and Noah went deeper into their family’s past, the wilder the story became. As the walls started to close in on the siblings, the film morphed into a thriller of sorts, using their combined paranoia to drive the story forward and generate some decent humor out of those moments. Tangling themselves into an usual web of deceit and backstabbing, Meg and Noah’s ordeal became one of life or death, contending with a resentful nurse named Grace (Lourd), the authorities and Lieutenant Zell (Camille James), and their oddball, sword-wielding cousin Brodie (Carrigan). Meanwhile, thoughts of their sick mother had the pair think of their future as it relates to somehow moving forward past this. However they were to move forward when everything is set and done, it would have to be together.

The best part of Adulthood is, as mentioned, is Gad and Scodelario as Noah and Meg Robles. Though the former may feel a bit miscast here, but his chemistry with Scodelario helps make up for it. The character of Noah is responsible for most of the film’s misses in terms of humor, but it is more about his pairing with Scodelario’s Meg than either individually. Not breaking any new ground writing-wise, they were fun to watch, as was Lourd and Carrigan as ridiculous supporting characters.

In the end, Adulthood may not set the world on fire but as it stands, is a solid dark comedy that is well executed and performed, despite the familiar material.

still courtesy of Paramount Pictures

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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.