On paper, Get a Job must have looked like a real winner sure to connect with millennials and starring two spunky stars, Miles Teller and Anna Kendrick. But the screenplay by Kyle Pennekamp and Scott Turpel
tries to cover too much ground and never really hangs together.
Will Davis (Miles Teller) has been successful as a college intern at the L.A. Weekly but finds that his expected post-graduation job there has been downsized into oblivion. Then, by sheer luck, he is hired by an "executive placement firm" to create resumes. Just when Will is settling down in his new position, an ambitious executive (Marcia Gay Harden) returns and lets everyone know that she intends to make the firm a lean and mean competitor in the field.
While Will is finding moments of fulfilment, his girlfriend Jillian (Anna Kendrick) is bored to death as a junior sales analyst. She and Will share a house with other millennials who are also experiencing disappointments in their quest to find meaningful work. Meanwhile, Will's dad (Bryan Cranston) has lost his 30-year job and has to eat all the advice he gave his son about making it in the dog-eat-dog world.
Miles Teller does not win our hearts with his shallow depiction of a creative young man, and we learn so little about Anna Kendrick's character that it is almost impossible to discern who she is or what she believes about the wonderful world of work. All in all, this is a weak and wobbly comedy.