Review: 'No Hard Feelings' is a raunchy sex comedy that skates by on Jennifer Lawrence's considerable talent and charm

Apparently, when Jennifer Lawrence gets material that’s beneath her — and the raunchy sex comedy “No Hard Feelings” is definitely beneath her — her response is to raise it up closer to her own level, through the sheer force of her talent and magnetism. 

Lawrence plays Maddie Barker, a 32-year-old Uber driver who’s a full-time resident of Montauk, a summer resort town on the farthest end of Long Island. On the morning we meet her, she’s fighting to keep her car from getting towed over nonpayment of house taxes — and the tow truck driver, Gary (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), a guy she once ghosted, isn’t in the mood to hear her pleas for leniency.

In need of a car, so she can earn enough money off the summer tourists to see her through the year, Maddie gets desperate. Then her pregnant best friend Sara (Natalie Morales) shows Maddy a Craigslist ad, from a rich couple (Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti) who offer a lightly used Buick Regal in exchange for “dating” — and the quotation marks are key here — their introverted 19-year-old son, Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman), before he leaves for Princeton. Maddie agrees to “date his brains out,” under the instructions that Percy’s not supposed to know the deal.

At first, Maddie comes on too strong, like when she finds Percy volunteering at an animal shelter, tending to a dachshund, and asking, “Can I touch your wiener?” After a few false starts — including an incredible scene where Maddie and Percy are skinny-dipping, and some drunk teens steal their clothes, only to get beaten up by Maddie, fully nude — Maddie starts to figure out that the way to fulfill her contract is to make friends with Percy. And when emotions come into play, everything gets complicated.

Director Gene Stupnitsky and co-screenwriter John Phillips, who previously made the kids-discover-porn comedy “Good Boys,” know their way around a dirty joke, and the movie has plenty of those. They’re less sure of themselves when the story turns tender, but by then the audience has built up enough goodwill for messed-up Maddie and painfully shy Percy to go with it.

None of it works, though, without Lawrence deploying her charm and forsaking her dignity in pursuit of a laugh. Lawrence shows a flair for physical comedy we haven’t seen much of, and she draws strong laughs with Maddie’s clumsily slutty attempts to woo Percy. When the movie turns sappy, though, Lawrence reminds us why she’s Oscar-caliber good, and gives “No Hard Feelings” some genuine feelings.

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‘No Hard Feelings’

★★★

Opens Friday, June 23, in theaters everywhere. Rated R for sexual content, some graphic nudity and brief drug use. Running time: 103 minutes.