FORCES OF NATURE
Between the unstoppable force that is Julia Louis-Dreyfus on Veep and the immovable object that is Will Ferrell in his best-known studio comedies like Anchorman, it’s hard to imagine anything other than clamour and chaos resulting should the two clang together.
“It was exciting to play a real couple”
And yet, it’s in the awkward, quiet negative spaces that their new film Downhill really hums. In what Louis-Dreyfus calls “a drama with comedic moments in it”, an avalanche at an Austrian ski resort hurtles toward an American family on holiday at a mountain resort; dad Pete (Ferrell) flees the scene as mum Billie (Louis-Dreyfus) tries to protect herself and their two children from an imminent snowy doom. Pete spends the rest of the movie trying to bury his monumental cowardice, which Billie can’t and won’t let slide. Downhill – Louis-Dreyfus’ first feature-film credit as a producer – is
