Reviewed by
Christopher Armstead
You’ve probably
heard or read, in far more
respectable publications than this
humble one, that Adam Sandler’s
latest film ‘Grown Ups 2’ isn’t
very good.
We’re not here to argue
that. It is
categorically worst than the first
‘Grown Ups’ which also wasn’t very
good, but at least it’s not nearly
as horrible as Sandler’s ‘Jack and
Jill’. ‘Grown Ups
2’ is also crass, tasteless and
juvenile, but not nearly as
tasteless as the last Sandler we
saw in ‘That’s my Boy’, but it’s
also not as funny.
Thus is in the next few
paragraphs, we won’t be able to
spin a positive review out of
‘Grown Ups 2’, but we can spin a
positive note.
Taylor Lautner… Best.
Performance. Ever.
Sure, this movie might be
awful, but Taylor… man… he found
his groove.
Playing an obnoxious frat
boy apparently caters to the young
man’s specific talents, plus he
even got to display his amazing
athletic skills.
The kid is a helluva
athlete. Okay, so I
never saw any of those ‘Twilight
Movies’… all the way through… but
I saw enough, and I did see ‘Shark
Boy and Lava Girl’ as well as
‘Abduction’ but those awful movies
are now just water under the
bridge. Did Taylor
save ‘Grown Ups 2’?
Oh hell no, it would take
Neo taking a special green pill
and waking up to find out this
movie was just a horrible dream to
save ‘Grown Ups 2’,
but Taylor and Stone Cold
would be your main draws to seeing
this film.
Is that a good thing?
Probably not, but it is a
thing.
So the boys and
their wives are back.
Lenny (Sandler) married to
the spicy Roxanne (Salma Hayek),
Kurt (Chris Rock) married to the
oppressive Deanne (Maya Rudolph),
Eric (Kevin James) married to the
controlling Sally (Maria Bello)
and Marcus who is
non-discriminating in his choices
of a mate.
Somehow Rob Schneider got
left off the roster this time
around. That’s cold.
I’m pretty sure Rob was
available that week so I don’t
know what went down there.
Similar to the first film there is no real plot or anything like that, but there are a bunch of little substories. The main one, I guess, is that Lenny has tired of the Hollywood game and moved the brood back to his home town. I don’t know where exactly this is. I’m gonna guess it’s in New York State somewhere. I guess if there’s an issue with this wide open and spacious neighborhood, it’s that the occasional deer will wander in your house and piss in your face. This happens in the movies first scene which at least reassures the audience that the mental challenges will be few and far between.
Other little stories we will be
dealing with include Marcus and the knowledge
the he has a crazed illegitimate child
(Alexander Ludwig) coming to visit, Roxanne’s
insane desire to have fourth child, Eric’s
desire to hang out with his mom (Georgia Engel),
the pompous frat boys hating on the townies,
Lenny having to deal with an old high school
bully (Stone Cold Steve Austin), and all kinds
of stuff.
It does come fast and furious so we do
give the filmmakers credit for keeping things
moving and putting in max effort in attempting
to make the audience laugh.
And eventually it will all boil
to a big 80’s party for the entire town,
culminating in a brawl.
Okay, so we’ve already laid the
claim that ‘Grown Ups 2’ is a fairly awful
movie, and worst… not very funny. To
contrast this, I also thought ‘The Heat’ was a
fairly awful movie that was, however, very
funny. Whaddayagonnado? But
there are some amazing things in this film. This
movie takes place over the course of a single
day, and about halfway through the day, simply
on a whim, Lenny and Roxanne decide to throw a
party. And
by the end of the day the entire town knows
about it, the house is completely decorated,
everybody in town has their costume, the bar is
completely stocked and somehow they even managed
to fly in the J. Geil’s Band. You try
pulling that off in 45 minutes.
Let’s go down our check list of
grossities that are required if you are making a
tasteless comedy.
Urine?
Check.
Vomit?
Check.
Burps?
Check.
Farts?
Check.
Excrement?
Check!
Semen?
Missing!
It’s PG-13 and that might’ve pushed it
over the edge.
Special thanks to Kevin James and his
character who knocked a couple of the
requirements out the box with his ability to
burp, sneeze and fart at the same time. Not
once, but three times. And a bonus time for
another character to close the show. Even
if that was funny the first time, which we are
going to go out on a limb and say it wasn’t, but
it will be exponentially less funny each
successive time.
And always remember Armstead’s first and
only rule of comedy… Dookey ain’t funny. Never
has been, never will be.
Now don’t allow me to let you
think that this movie is devoid of laughter, no
sir, it has a couple of really good guffaws
littered throughout its 100 minute runtime. It
would be darn near impossible for this movie not
to pull off some semblance of laughter with the
talent assembled, though I have seen it done
before, but it does have some good laughs. Just
not enough of them. And if Adam wants to give
Nick Swardson a break for his next few movies,
I’m not going to hate him for it.
I will admit I am surprised that this garnered a sequel as I didn’t see ‘Grown Ups’ as a viable franchise, but that’s why I’m a broke… whatever it is I do… and those guys are rich, and this movie is doing decent business. No, it’s not very good or all that funny, just like the first one, but who am I to argue with success?
