They had a story arc on “The Office” in which B.J. Novak’s duplicitous and disdainful hipster Ryan somehow got promoted way up the corporate ladder and moved to New York, where he proceeded to become an even bigger jerk, got hooked on drugs and was eventually arrested for committing corporate fraud. In writer-director-star Novak’s scathing social satire “Vengeance,” he plays a character who isn’t all that different from Ryan—only this guy might be even more cynical, more immersed in his smart phone, more of an opportunistic narcissist.
It’s a smart and insightful performance in a film that has a lot to say about the personal disconnect we feel in today’s Wi-Fi world; the stereotypes held by Blue Staters about Red Staters and vice versa, and the manner in which millions of us consider every waking moment as potential material, to be memorialized in a selfie or a tweet or a Tik-Tok video or a podcast. At times Novak the writer-director is shooting fish in a barrel, but those fishies are worthy targets.
