Tiffany Haddish and Rose Byrne are friends and business partners in a film with promise but a confused idea of what women really want
![Like a Boss review – female friendship comedy mistakes raunch for humor](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/8ae0bbb81275b16e62c98b60531468bcb2418009/0_26_2281_1369/master/2281.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctcmV2aWV3LTIucG5n&enable=upscale&s=8491334a925085c1fa8040d5d56b8117)
About halfway through Like A Boss, ostensibly a
comedy for women about female friendship and some business ethics, two beauty entrepreneurs and best friends, Mel (Tiffany Haddish) and Mia (Rose Byrne), meet their main competition for a major makeup showcase: two straight guys. They have their own makeup line designed around what they assume women want: to wear “cherry-poppin’” lip gloss, to cover up their flaws, to look hot for men. The makeup dudes are supposed to be a joke – a ridiculous contrast to the earnest empowerment of Mel and Mia’s line, which assumes women beautify for themselves – but I couldn’t help feeling like the bit encapsulates the film, directed by Miguel Arteta, as a whole. It’s a movie starring women and marketed to women as a girls night out romp that mistakes the surface-level mention of sex or bodily functions or raunch for something real, or humorous, or what women want.
Related: Underwater review – Kristen Stewart's soggy, silly monster movie