Zoey Deutch is a phenomenal actress with stunning talent that knows no bounds. She can do it all, from deep drama to stylized comedy. On the big screen in the last 12 months alone, she nailed the ditzy blonde role in Zombieland: Double Tap and now she has carved out a brilliant badass with her turn as Peg in Buffaloed.
Peg is a dreamer who backs up her passion for banking big bucks with a work ethic that is second to none. Sadly, this Buffalo native gets close to success and then has it whisked away from her—much like the city’s beloved football team, the Bills. The young woman is living at home with her mother Kathy (Judy Greer) and brother JJ (Noah Reid). They are an embodiment of the hard-working folks of that New York state city. Kathy runs a hair salon in her home but cannot seem to ever get ahead of her bills and the family phone rings constantly from bill collectors. JJ has a dream of owning a bar, and even though he took over mortgage payments on his favorite watering hole, he too cannot seem to get ahead of the curve and turn the bar into a money maker.
Things change when Peg is popped for scalping fake Buffalo Bills tix and she’s sent to jail. Her attorney tackling the judge after they disagreed about who has the best chicken wings (a delicacy that originated in the fabled New York locale) certainly didn’t help her case. But it did introduce her to the prosecutor, the city’s assistant DA. Graham (Jermaine Fowler) truly gets to meet her when she gets out of prison and he frequents her brother’s bar—which is where she is working because who will hire a recently released felon? He will play a vital role in this film and Peg’s. Will they or won’t they was answered quickly. The bigger inquiry centers around how her relationship with him will influence her newfound career.
After answering one of those bill collector calls, she learns that they are located in Buffalo (and we learn that the city is home to an enormous amount of bill collecting companies). She schools the caller and figures out she can do it better than him and in a business where the agents making these calls we hate to receive, score a percentage of the payment should they convince the person at the other end of the phone to part with their cash.
No spoilers here, but let’s just say that as Peg learns from her first company, headed by Wizz (Jai Courtney), that work ethic and stoic determination to get rich will be her best asset and potentially get her in trouble with the law … again.
Deutch is not only the lead actress, but she co-produced the film as well. This is firmly a passion project where her zeal is felt on every single frame of the picture. It is a role unlike any other on her resume and it also is not merely an entertaining experience watching Buffaloed, it also is an enlightening one when it comes to the debt collecting business.
As the film commences and we slowly but surely learn about Peg, with Deutch’s turn in Zombieland: Double Tap fresh on the brain, one wonders how she is going to embody this soul. This is one tough cookie. This is someone you would not want to alienate or aggravate at any level. The actress firmly proves that size does not matter one iota and showcases that an actress (or actor) of supreme talent can come off as anything physically with their performance. Courtney is an impressive physical presence as an actor and there are a multitude of moments where he and Deutch are verbally going at it (and one can see a physical altercation one bad word away from happening) and not for one second does the viewer worry that Peg can’t handle herself. In fact, we tend to concern ourselves with the wellbeing of his character if he were to tangle with Peg!
There’s also a sensitivity there with Peg that had to be the most challenging of needles to thread for the actress. After all, she does have a heart and it pains her to see debtors mishandled by collectors and this soft spot also leads her to her hires for her new company. They are a cornucopia of folks whose skills in some other arena sparked something in Peg that led her to believe that they will help her get rich, while getting wealthy themselves in the process. This is all achieved with an absolute believability and not one single dose of suspension of disbelief from the performance of every ensemble member of Buffaloed.
Courtney has a ball with this unsavory character. The Aussie actor is a Buffalo boy in every sense of the words. The actor got to show off his own unique skills throughout bringing Brian Sacca’s script to life. So too does Greer. She took what could have been a thankless mother of the star role and made it firmly her own. After all, this is a case of the apple not falling far from the tree and Deutch has crafted a pretty powerful apple, so Greer’s tree must be as strong as an oak! The versatile actress delivers some humorous moments to break up the tension, but also provides a very hold-no-prisoners backbone to Kathy that moms of the upstate city would be proud to see embodied by Greer.
Director Tanya Wexler has an even hand throughout this surprise gem of a flick. She is an absolute actor’s director. That comes through in every single scene. Wexler illustrates that the nuances of directing a film that balances so many milieus can be achieved by hiring actors to fill out your ensemble who have demonstrated a panache for running the emotive spectrum gamut. Cannot wait to see where she goes next. This is a director to keep an eye on with everything she tackles.
Speaking of watching everything she does, Buffaloed is another perfect example of Deutch doing Deutch. There are versatile performers and then there’s this young actress whose talent—believe it or not—appears to have barely scratched the surface. There is much for her to accomplish and she shows her willingness to be a part of any artistic endeavor that puts a premium on story, but also possessing female characters that are as multidimensional as exists.
Grade: B+