Review: Date Night (2010) TH

A night of misadventures and misunderstandings

Phil (Carell) and Claire (Fey) Foster are an average couple from New Jersey who have harmless full time jobs, two highly active kids and most importantly no time to build on the romance and adventure they once started out with. They seem to have become a cross between best friends and brother and sister, as they're familiar enough to give out sarcastic and sometimes dry jokes with some comedic observations thrown in at what was them or could really be them. They're so busy and responsible that they hardly noticed the slump of doing the same ol' things in the same ol' order until their close friends the Sullivans (Mark Ruffalo, Kristen Wiig) are getting a separation from lack of wind in their sails. Claire and Phil decide to turn a regular date night into one they'll remember, except it ends up being more than they bargained for.

After getting shot down for a reservation at a trendy, upscale restaurant called Claw over in New York, they pretend to be the Tripplehorns to snag a table. Quicker than you can say, "If you're looking for trouble, it's bound to find you," two guys who appear to be restaurant employees ask the now drunk couple to step outside. Soon enough things turn for the "North by Northwest" worst, as these are gun waving fellows are looking to get a flashdrive back for their boss Joe Miletto (Ray Liotta) and don't believe the two aren't really the Tripplehorns. Instead of getting filled with lead, Phil and Claire go with the flow and make up information in hopes that something will come up in the meantime. Opportunity strikes and they get away only to find themselves jumping back and forth to escape the two that look like henchmen but might be something else.

From one location to the next, they end up breaking every other law, get help from the continually shirtless private security guy named Holbrooke Grant (Mark Wahlberg), to meeting the real Tripplehorns called Whippit (Mila Kunis) and Taste (James Franco) that are just a couple of movie referencing Bonnie and Clydes who got in over their heads. This is an exaggerated cinematic world where regular people exceed and bad guys are really bad. Everyone is a caricature of their type from shady gangsters, perverted politicians to corrupt cops, which makes the experience purposely silly and far from ground-breaking but still a somewhat fun formula because it doesn't even take itself seriously. Some situations jump the ship of just being plain dumb, such as both attempting to pole dance and then like a miss episode of SNL it carries on far too long. There's a tad of action between the one-liners and sometimes inventive remarks, including an impossible but wild car chase and some guns waved and fired. Fey and Carell are both energetic and well-timed out with their back and forth banter in between their characters trying to figure out an exit strategy. This is about two regular folks attempting to save their own skin and simultaneously save the day. Been there, done that countless times, but it's still an easy and unchallenging ride to relax and loosen up with to pass the time even if it doesn't claim to be a first rate film.

Director: Shawn Levy (Just Married, Night at the Museum)
Starring: Steve Carell, Tina Fey, Mark Wahlberg, Ray Liotta, Mark Ruffalo, Kristen Wiig
Website: IMDB


Quotes:

Claire: "That's amazing, Jeremy, but I'm gonna go home now and fart into a shoe box."

Woman at book club meeting: "This part really spoke to me. I mean, to walk 20 miles for water, and then to suddenly discover that you're menstruating?"
Phil: "Quite sad."
Woman: "Sir, you have no idea what it is like to be a teenage girl having your first period under Taliban rule."

Taste: "This is about how I'm an asshole all the time, huh? How you have no trust that I can pull things through."
Whippit: "Yeah!"
Taste: "How I can't do anything right? I buy the wrong soda?"
Whippit: "Yeah."
Taste: "The wrong beer!"
Phil: "I hear you, man."
Taste: "The wrong nipple clamps."
Phil: "Well..."
Whippit: "Those clamps hurt me!"

Review: Little Fockers (2010) TH

The third phase

This newest installment in the Focker series is launching to the next level with blossoming kids, tempting infidelity and making consideration for carrying on the proud lineage of the family legacy. Despite the title, the main players are Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro, with the other characters showing up on the wayside to inject little subplots to accelerate the two mentioned--sometimes fitting in, sometimes forced to fit.

This has gags like the other films and the roster is full of eccentric characters to create more situational comedy. There are goofs galore, sex taboos out the wazoo and loads of misunderstandings to unfold. I congratulate them for not reducing themselves to nothing but one liners and one-off quips. This instead attempts to build up in-jokes and layered scenarios, though the problem is you can see them in a slow march a mile away. It retreads similar ground, such as the play on the Focker name, male nurse jabs, gay scenarios, bodily noise and fluid jokes, someone walking in at the wrong time. Ben Stiller is hamming it up on the whole social etiquette bit: the nice guy who doesn't want to offend anyone so he takes the long route to fix it. Though his character is slightly evolving towards building up courage when confrontation arises. Robert De Niro's character's days of mean are slowly loosening up and coming to terms, as he's finding out all that stubbornness is too aggressive and there's a chance he might get pushed away from treating others like pawns.

There's a noticeable formula with "Little Fockers." As a movie to stretch your feet and relax to without much complication it's sufficient to just meeting the grade with a little bit of easy fun, though having high hopes and wanting to relive the experience is another set of issues. A decade ago this might have been fresh but a share of the jokes feel derivative and predictable, such as something always going wrong in a completely awkward and embarrassing way, but if you can count on it each time in advance then there's no real surprise. There are some sentimental messages slipped in without getting too sappy, like "the going is tough but we're in it together," or "living your life the best way you can even if it's flawed in other's views." However, there's not much to linger with a viewer that tops the other films in the series, or even other situational comedies that have pushed the envelope in the last decade further or just had more charm, fluidly or pizazz to give sparks to a roaring fire of laughter.

Director: Paul Weitz (American Pie, About a Boy)
Starring: Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Jessica Alba, Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand, Teri Polo, Owen Wilson
Website: IMDB