Two couples head to a remote cabin to celebrate New Year and confront the possible collapse of their marriages in Nora Kirkpatrick’s Couples Weekend.

Films about relationships falling apart are plentiful, largely because the subject is so universally recognisable, whether through personal experience or watching others unravel. Affairs, in particular, remain a favourite dramatic catalyst because they’re scandalous, messy, and rich with narrative potential. They invite questions about how they began, why they happened, and what damage they leave behind.

Couples Weekend opens with the shape of a horror film, a small group isolated in a remote cabin, vulnerable not to a lurking threat but to their own dysfunction. The terror comes from being trapped together in circumstances that magnify every flaw. Debs (Alexandra Daddario) and Mitch (Josh Gad) return from a walk in the snowy wilderness to find their partners cheating on them with each other. Debs wants to confront them immediately, while Mitch urges caution so they can decide how to handle the discovery. Once the truth surfaces, friendships and marriages collapse under the pressure of being snowed in together.

It’s a strong setup. A single claustrophobic cabin, a group of highly strung characters, and a revelation that guarantees volatile reactions. They can retreat to separate rooms, but the shared spaces force them back together, creating a steady sense of escalation. The problem is how the film uses its running time. It lingers on less interesting beats and rushes past the ones that could generate real tension. Debs and Mitch trying to act normal while secretly aware of the affair is a great idea, yet it lasts only a few minutes before the film moves on to dismantling the group’s relationships. Their brief attempt to keep the affair secret could have driven the film’s most interesting tension, but it’s gone almost as soon as it starts. The awkwardness of being snowed in together after the truth comes out is similarly underused. Even the isolated setting and the broken heating register as incidental details, and the owner’s (Kevin Pollak) unexpected visit further undermines the sense of being cut off.

The film wants to explore the idea that affairs don’t happen in a vacuum and uses its group of dysfunctional characters to do it. Each of them is unhappy in a different way, and each pretends to be more fulfilled than they are. Debs is a book editor who longs to write, and Mitch is successful in business but miserable in his job. There’s also a suggestion that their marriages were built on convenience rather than genuine desire, which makes it easy to believe they were heading for collapse long before this weekend. These are strong ideas, but the characters are too thin to support them. The cast commits to the material, yet the characters don’t have the layers these ideas need.

Josh Gad and Alexandra Daddario fare best. They’re believable as childhood friends, and Gad finds comedy in moments where others might struggle. Daddario is at her strongest when she goes big and manic, and the two have real chemistry. They have almost none with the actors playing their spouses, which seems intentional and supports the film’s point about mismatched relationships. Daveed Diggs and Ashley Park are far less distinctive, partly because they have far less to play. They start as the apparent villains until the film reveals that none of the characters are innocent, a shift that should offer plenty for the actors but never quite does. The material leans heavily toward Gad and Daddario, giving them broader emotional beats while Diggs and Park spend most of the film apologising or deflated. The script also leans on familiar devices such as Mitch’s unrequited affection for Debs, predictable excuses from every corner, and a run of revelations that feel routine once the affair is exposed.

A late introduction of some home‑made hooch loosens everyone’s tongues, giving the cast a chance to play unhinged in the way only a mystery alcoholic concoction can. It works as a narrative device because it pushes major revelations to the surface quickly, and it’s entertaining in the moment, but it also adds to the problem of rushing past ideas that need time. The concepts built into the setup are rushed through before they can take shape, without the nuance that would make them resonate. The cast do what they can, but the script’s limitations ultimately define the film.

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Verdict

A muddled movie that’s rich with tension and potential but never lets either fully take shape.

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