2008 comedy directed by Adam McKay and written by McKay and Will Ferrell, the same comedy team behind countless SNL sketches, Anchorman and Talladega Nights. This one is about two medical professionals who hit it off and soon learn that they both have a 40-something son whose still living at home. This couple soon falls in love, marries and moves in together. Now, I'm going to lay a little test on you at this point, because that's really about all you need to know about the story and premise. Here's my test: there's a scene where the dad makes a treehouse for the boys and fills it with Penthouse magazine b/c he knows they like it. Now, did that make you crack up? I mean, really laugh hard? Or did it, like me, make you mildly smile but pretty much forget about it two seconds later. Well, I use that as a test, b/c that's really a snapshot of the movie. It doesn't really matter what happens in the movie b/c really it's just one moderately funny joke played over and over. I asked at one point, "what could the director say during this scene, except, alright John and Will, now, act like your seven and react to whatever happens like a seven-year-old." And it's funny, b/c they're not seven, right? Well, there you have it folks, that's the whole movie. I'm not saying it's never funny. All I'm saying is that one can only see so many shticky moments like this and keep laughing. After an hour or so, I just really didn't care anymore and wasn't doing any laughing. Maybe I just don't have the type of sense of humor that's amused by premise-alone or maybe this movie just falls short b/c all it has going for it is it's premise.
Saturday Afternoon
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