At times, the Midwestern satire “Butter” is almost funny, and in its honor I almost laughed.
“Butter” is a would-be “Best in Show” of the dairy belt, or to be more blunt, it’s another in the bicoastal indie industry’s endless series of self-congratulatory comedies about the alleged dopiness of middle American hicks who do things like read Parade magazine and decorate with flags.
A prissy wife (Jennifer Garner) whose husband (Ty Burrell) is a butter-sculpture champ — his campy works include the Passion of the Christ with Neil Diamond as Jesus and Newt Gingrich on horseback — gives the art form a go when he retires. She faces competition for the title from a profanity-spewing hooker (Olivia Wilde) who seduces her husband. Another butter battler is a 10-year-old black girl (Yara Shahidi) who is the film’s voice of reason, up to a point. She says things like, “Are these crackers for real?” No, actually, they aren’t. Not even close.
Garner, whose trademark look of banal vapidity has become a little too convincing over the last decade, mugs incessantly, making her a poor choice for a movie that’s far too broad to begin with. Eyes and cheekbones do not an actress make, though with her inner-tube lips she’s fine for lip-gloss commercials, or maybe doing ads for floatation devices.