This Absurd Work-Life Balance Satire Has One Of The Best Movie-Long Punchlines I’ve Seen In Years

Pasqual’s pregnant partner Christine is about ready to burst when he gets a call from Drake’s representatives asking him and his directing partner to shoot an upcoming music video. Pasqual has already promised Christine he’d spend more time with her, but it’s Drake. It’s an opportunity the duo can’t pass up, but Pasqual knows he can’t let down Christine.

Serious People

Release Date

January 27, 2025

Runtime

86 Minutes

Director

Pasqual Gutierrez, Ben Mullinkosson

Writers

Pasqual Gutierrez

The relationship between Christine and Pasqual is maybe the purest thing in Serious People, a surrealist satire about work-life balance that says the scales must always be tipped one way or the other. Pasqual is trying to make sure Christine has what she needs, often at the expense of his career and his working relationships. Of course, that kind of blind love (or idiocy, when you consider Pasqual’s plan) can be just as destructive as choosing your career over your partner.

Serious People Is A Dopplegänger Comedy As Absurd As It Is Real

A Final, Literal Punchline Brings Everything Full Circle

In order to placate Christine and Raul, Pasqual picks a lookalike that will act as him on the set of the Drake music video. The OVO crew has never met Pasqual, so as long as his replacement Miguel reins it in and acts professionally, things should be fine. Except, that’s exactly the opposite of what Miguel is going to do – we know this even before we officially meet him.

When we do, he’s what you’d expect of someone who would audition for a job like this. Professing music video aspirations of his own, Miguel is all about visuals. He loves the way his biceps look in the selfies he takes with his Dodge Challenger. When he finally gets on set to discuss the concept of the music video, he says he wants it to look “like a Marvel movie” – whatever that means.

He wants to shoot the video in IMAX, shouting this at anyone who can hear him. He wants a stripper to jump from pole to pole like a super-powered human (Marvel movie, remember?). For some reason, Pasqual routinely ignores Miguel, pushing Raul to the edge of insanity.

Ultimately, Miguel versus Pasqual and Raul becomes a battle of surface-level aesthetics versus well-thought-out artistry, but Serious People doesn’t care who is really on which side. Could Miguel be the real artist here? It’s a joke that the film toys with even when it comes to physical blows on the set of Drake’s music video.

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Considering the current standing of Drake in popular culture at large (even before Kendrick Lamar absolutely demolished him in “Not Like Us”), it’s clear Serious People is making fun of the rapper just as much as it’s making fun of people like Pasqual, Raul, and Miguel.

Miguel manages to worm his way into Pasqual’s personal life, all while the latter ignores how irritating and abrasive his dopplegänger is. One of Christine’s friends hooks up with him, only to wake up with a missing necklace. Lest you get concerned that this dopplegänger situation is leading to violence, though, don’t worry.

The transgressions committed by your out-of-pocket dupe can elevate him to new heights where the levels of self-seriousness are so off-the-charts, they hit the stratosphere.

Serious People is much more about how people like Miguel can ingratiate themselves to other people under the guise of seriousness, becoming, by pure chance, what they had embodied the whole time. Los Angeles is a place where business is cyclical – one minute, you could be working with a high-profile star and the next, the transgressions committed by your out-of-pocket dupe can elevate him to new heights where the levels of self-seriousness are so off-the-charts, they hit the stratosphere.

It’s a brutal cycle, but Serious People doesn’t deal in cynicism. Its quiet ending wraps things up too tidily, but there’s a strange sort of optimism to its idiocy that is quite endearing. Pasqual and Christine will be fine, as will Drake and Miguel and even Raul. They take themselves too seriously to realize that everything is actually so unserious all the time.

Serious People debuted at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival on January 27.

Serious People

Release Date

January 27, 2025

Runtime

86 Minutes

Director

Pasqual Gutierrez, Ben Mullinkosson

Writers

Pasqual Gutierrez

Pros & Cons

• Serious People’s LA satire is as absurd as it is hilarious.
• Serious People’s stars give perfect comedic performances.
• The events of the film being centered around a Drake music video shoot add a heightened sense of realism that culminates in a brilliant punchline (literally).

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