Eric D. Snider
Are We Done Yet?
Movie Review
"Are We Done Yet?"
Review by Eric D. Snider
Grade: F
Rating: PG
Released: Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Directed by:
Cast:
The one positive thing I can say about "Are We There Yet?," the 2005 family comedy in which Ice Cube is harassed by bratty kids, is that it came out in 2005 and I haven't had to think about it since then. It exists only in the past, where it can't hurt us.
So why the F-bomb is there now a sequel, called "Are We Done Yet?"? And why is it a remake of a perfectly good 1948 Cary Grant/Myrna Loy movie called "Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House"? Who approved this? Who wanted this? Who will see this? Ice Cube's legions of under-10 fans? People who love Cary Grant but always felt he should have been a little bit less expressive, a little bit more like a bumbling, thuggish bear? People who have sustained massive head injuries?
Mr. Cube reprises his role as Nick Persons, a Portland man who, after the events chronicled in "Are We There Yet?," for some reason married Suzanne (Nia Long) and adopted her two dreadful children, 13-year-old Lindsey (Aleisha Allen) and less-than-13-year-old Kevin (Philip Bolden). They've been living in Nick's cramped apartment, but now Suzanne is pregnant, and it's time to buy a real house.
They find a beautiful old home out in the country and are charmed by the shmoozy realtor, Chuck (John C. McGinley, never more irritating), who convinces them of its merits. No sooner do they move in, however, than things start to fall apart. Turns out the house needs massive repairs, which would have been spotted if Nick had hired an inspector. Even without that, don't you have legal recourses when you buy a seemingly OK house that turns out to be rotting from the inside, the way they have "lemon laws" for cars?
It doesn't matter! Nick hires the local contractor, who also turns out to be Chuck. (Chuck is also a city inspector and a licensed midwife.) (And that's not a joke. He really is.) Chuck brings in a team of baffling sub-characters to assist on the job, including some blind plumbers (WTF?) and a family of obese Hawaiians whose expertise lies in repairing dry rot.
Oh, dry rot. That reminds me of one of the many stupid quirks in the film's dialogue. When somebody says something surprising to Nick, he'll repeat the thing back to them but replace the second part of it with "what?!" For example: "You've got dry rot." "Dry what?!" Also (as Chuck leans close to Suzanne's pregnant belly): "I'm a baby whisperer." "A baby what?!" Hey Nick, you're a jackass. (A jack-what?!)
The dialogue also includes a lot of lines that are broad, obvious set-ups for disaster, the kind where as soon as you hear it, you know exactly what's going to happen next. For example: The chandelier falls onto the dinner table, causing Lindsey to say, "At least the table is strong!" Instantly, of course, the table collapses. Later: "Isn't it great to have the place to ourselves?," followed immediately by pesky Chuck pulling up in the driveway. Also, while Nick takes the kids for a walk in the woods: "There's nothing to be afraid of," whereupon Nick sees a deer and is terrified. The deer's eyes even bug out.
And that reminds me of two other bizarre animal-related incidents. First, after Nick's pursuit of a raccoon causes him to fall off the roof (one of two times he falls off the roof in this movie), the raccoon looks down at Nick and says, "Sucker!" Later, when Nick falls into the pond and comes face to face with a huge fish, Nick screams, and so does the fish. Yes, the raccoon talks, and yes, the fish screams. What are we to make of this? Every other element of the film, while improbable, unrealistic, and frustratingly predictable, at least seems to occur in the real world (albeit a world in which the laws of gravity are not diligently enforced). So why the screaming fish and the talking raccoon and the bug-eyed deer?
I'll tell you why: Because this movie is desperate. Its story is paper-thin (guy buys house; repairs drive guy insane), and so screenwriter Hank Nelken ("Saving Silverman") and director Steve Carr ("Rebound," "Daddy Day Care") are forced into panic mode. They have to fill 90 minutes! They have to make Nick run around frantically and trip over things and get things stuck to him and have bats in the chimney and get into a fight with a guy who knows capoeira! When you're desperate to make a comedy yet have no funny ideas to put in it, all you can do is throw everything at the wall and hope some of it sticks.
Almost none of it does. I chuckled twice during the movie, at two brief gags that were genuinely surprising and funny. The rest is a grotesque mass of comedy gone wrong. Some characters behave without motivation (I'm not sure why Suzanne gets mad at Nick and moves out; it's not HIS fault the repair work is taking so long); others don't need to be in the film at all (young Kevin gets about 90 seconds of screen time). When Suzanne goes into labor and Chuck the midwife's car won't start, he doesn't call a cab or ask a friend for a ride or borrow a neighbor's bicycle; he speed-walks. Why? Because he mentioned earlier that he was on the U.S. speed-walking team in the 1994 Goodwill Games, and it's "funny" to see that fact come into play later in the movie.
Do you see what I'm talking about here? This is a stupid, unfunny movie made -- I have to assume -- by stupid, unfunny people. I've never even seen the old Cary Grant version, and yet I know that even if it was the worst film of 1948, it's still 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times better than "Are We Done Yet?"
Grade: F
Rated PG, a little mild innuendo, lots of comic mishaps
1 hr., 32 min.
Copyright © Eric D. Snider.
This work may not be transmitted via the Internet, nor reproduced in any other way, without written consent from Eric D. Snider.
This item has 19 comments
April 6, 2007 at 7:36 am
There aren't lemon laws for houses and lemon laws for cars only apply to new cars. Most lenders will require a home inspection though. But in the world of stupid movies, we should just assume that normal laws don't apply.
April 6, 2007 at 7:58 am
"Who wanted this? Who will see this?"
Eric, I hate to scare you, but the theater where I live has three screens (of 16) devoted to this movie. Yes, it likely will need that many. Norbit also had three screens, and many shows sold out. Grindhouse (three showings) is sharing a screen with Premonition (one showing). The Lookout also has only one showing (10pm), and The Hoax isn't playing at all. (Wild Hogs has five showings, btw.)
The end is nigh.
April 6, 2007 at 10:08 am
Brad
Where is this awful place where God has ceased to bestow His loving kindness and mercy?
Actually that's probably unfair. I wanted to blame the theater at first, but they really don't have much to choose from. I just checked a list of the last few months of movies and we're not exactly reaping a bounteous harvest of good ones. And because we're so starved for entertainment, we're tricked into thinking that movies are better than they really are (Children of Men I'm looking at you). It's like when you're cooking for yourself in college, and McDonalds suddenly tastes gourmet (or like when you saw Star Wars Episode III and thought, "this was 1000x better than Episode II, therefore it must be great!)
Anyway, there are still great movies that have come out, it just seems like they're getting fewer and farther between. So is it Hollywood's fault for not giving us enough selection? Or is it our fault for filling up three screens worth of "Are We Done Yet?" I mean, if I was in a position to make a crappy movie and still make millions of dollars, I'd probably do it. Let's allow capitalism to do the work for us! Stop spending money on crappy movies! It's possible to have smart dumb-humor!
(btw, Mr. Blandings is about the same entertainment level as any other Cary Grant movie. If you like Cary Grant movies (I do), you'll like Mr. Blandings)
April 6, 2007 at 12:53 pm
I had to look it up but that's 10 septillion times better.
April 6, 2007 at 1:23 pm
When I saw a commercial for this movie, I pitied reviewers everywhere. Thanks for taking the bullet, Eric. (No that I would've gotten in the line of fire anyway, but still...)
April 6, 2007 at 1:24 pm
Didn't Hanks already cover this territory 20 years ago with "The Money Pit," albeit from the rich, nerdy, white guy perspective?
April 6, 2007 at 6:52 pm
You deserve this movie, Eric D. Snider.com. You should have been happy with mediocre films like Norbit and Premonition, but you complained about them instead. The God of Crappy Movies is a vengeful being, and He shall inflict movies like this on you over and over again until you're frantically begging to see something by, say, the Wayans brothers.
April 6, 2007 at 7:40 pm
What I wonder is, are there lemon laws for movies? If there is such a law, I'm sure that you wouldn't have any recourse if you saw a movie starring Martin Lawrence because you should know better.
April 7, 2007 at 12:57 pm
if you take this movie seriously then you will not like this movie at.[ asked my son what he wanted to see.he told me are we done yet.it was a nice family movie
April 9, 2007 at 1:19 pm
RICHARD FARBER makes a good point in. we should just be happy we live in a country where there]are movies in the world to watch because when I ask my son what he wants to watch and he says the Wiggles that makes the wiggles oscar material
April 9, 2007 at 2:19 pm
Hey, at least we still have "Delta Farce" starrring Larry the Cable Guy to look forward to. Right? Who's with me? Guys?!
April 9, 2007 at 4:32 pm
Movies like this one make me wonder if life is truly worth living.
And Larry the Cable Guy makes me wonder what the world would be like without flatulence.
April 11, 2007 at 3:25 pm
#3 is my soul mate. Reasons for said statement:
a. The quality of almost every movie has gone down hill since Lord of the Rings.
b. Children of Men had so much possibility and due to a. absolutely tanked.
c. Star Wars ll needs to die a horrible movie death.
d. Mr. Blandings is a really great movie, mostly because of Cary Grant. (I also recommend Bringing Up Baby)
Thank you David for upholding my deepset beliefs.
April 11, 2007 at 3:27 pm
I meant that LOTR was excellent, not that it was bad. Just wanted to make that clear.
April 11, 2007 at 5:05 pm
Lowdogg you make a great point and nice subtle imitations of RICHARD FARBER and his unique writing style. It made me laugh more than the column and I laughed quite a bit at this one.
April 21, 2007 at 11:07 pm
Thank you. You addressed the one point of the movie that pissed me off the most. Those screaming, bug eyed animals. Not that I've seen the movie, or want to, but you can only see a retarded animation of a dear gettin bug eyed and screaming so many times before you develop an aneurysm. Apparently, the commercial alone sums up the movie, and that is in no way a good thing.
Movies are getting worse, not just because of the Hollywood Homogenization machines, but because people lap this stuff up like antifreeze at a petting zoo. And this "movie" is no different. Comment #2 made that clear.
April 25, 2007 at 8:20 pm
Let's not jump the gun here this is the movie dumping ground before the big summer blockbusters set in. And to indicate that LOTR were the last great movies ever made is really closing yourself off.
May 1, 2007 at 5:00 pm
The person who wrote comment #6, thank you. That's exactly what I thought when I saw the trailer in the theater for this movie. I leaned over to my date and said, "That's just a remake of the Money Pit." Keen observation, Blogonoid.
June 11, 2007 at 7:41 am
I fink its really gd. I haven't seen it yet. But my very very very gd friend has seen it a she thought it was super!! Xx