Paul Powers

The premise is confused. The movie flits between Harry Potter and Violent Night. The Rock is more wooden than Keanu Reeves in the third Matrix movie. There's no way The Waitress from Its Always Sunny in Philidelphia ever spawned a kid with Chris Evans. However, Chris Evans is the only person who appears to be acting and having a good time. I could go on and on with the negativity, but I just want to finish on this... Hollywood... Please, for the love of quality and everything good that's gone in movies before... STOP with the green screen backgrounds. They're flat, dull, lifeless... Much like Dwayne Johnson's performance. It was as bad as The Marvels and it's got to stop. It's ruining all modern movies. If you want a good Christmas action movie there's tons out there with better acting, casts and stories... Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, Violent Night. Unfortunately, this one isn't it. It's bad.

Great cast, crazy concept. I loved this as kid in the 80s seeing the fun that could be had in the workplace and enjoying the magical romance. Braver than any of the modern productions that focus on "the message".

This movie, shot somewhat like a documentary, was painful to get through. When I saw the cast of Murphy and Hill I was initially curious. I really love almost everything that Eddie Murphy has been a part of since the beginning of his career. He never seems to fail, until it comes to this character. There were some decent interactions between the father and his brother, but the rest of the time the role could have been played by anyone, there was nothing there, no effort, no glimmer of that Murphy star or energy. It was like watching the last decade of Willis just dialling it in. One of the most frustrating things about the movie are the multiple scenes that rely on second-hand or third-hand knowledge of references that are meaningful or applicable to a narrow community within LA/Hollywood. There was one scene between Hill’s character and his podcast co-star where they spoke in references for the entire thing. I’m no stranger to hip hop, but I literally had no idea who this scene, or the movie overall is for? It doesn’t have international or wide audience appeal. That’s fine, but perhaps it needs a new label, because although there were a few minor laugh out loud moments this movie was painful to watch and not at all funny. I’ve started to notice a trend of dramas being called comedies lately. It’s like the producers aren’t ballsy enough to call a drama a drama and just splice some funny scenes into it and pop the movie in a more marketable genre for profit. It’s sly. I don’t want to dis anyone’s appearance in particular, but Jonah Hill needs to start taking better care of himself, Eddie Murphy looks younger than him in this movie. He’s supposed to be playing a 35 year-old, but he looks exhausted. I think the mirroring of the conflicts between the mother-in-law and daughter-in law and the son-in-law and father-in-law just weren’t comparable experiences and came off as ill-conceived. David Duchovny was phenomenal in this role and was the only person who seemed to get this character. I feel like there were moments here that worked so much better in 'Meet the Parents' like when Stiller and DeNiro have their awkward exchanges at the dining table and ultimately Stiller’s Focker knocks the ashes off the mantel and the cat urinates in them. The equivalent here being the candle in the Islamic hat and it being burnt and stepped on. I saw it coming a mile off and it didn’t pay off. I just found it to be not in-line with the tone of the rest of the movie. I can’t fault the acting of the main actress, she was great throughout, although are people really like that, so up and down, aggressive and then nice? It seemed odd. Every couple has issues, but as in the ultimate message of this mess, love conquers all. Nothing ever comes of Murphy videoing Hill acting the fool on the basketball court in an “Along Came Polly / White Men Can’t Jump” mash-up. It’s clear where Jonah Hill got his influence from. You can imagine him and Rogan sitting around the bong one night…”Dude, you know what would be cool?”. “Dude, tell me bro”. “If we rip off Stiller's classics and add black people” “Yeah bro, that would be so Zeitgeist”. Overall, despite its rare and infrequent charm, the only lasting impression this movie leaves is one of virtue signally, patronizing instructions on how to navigate Western American cultural issues and one of sincere loss for the days when comedies were actually, you know, funny! Fun to watch, with some silliness and not all about “THE MESSAGE”. File this one under BLM for Boring Lame Movies.