‘Daddy’s’ and ‘Moms’ depressingly similar
After enduring last week's lousy and lazy "A Bad Moms Christmas," I would have bet it would be many a year before we'd see another holiday comedy more sour and cynical and profoundly unfunny. I sit corrected. 7KH ¿UVW 'DGG\ V +RPH ZDV ¿OPHG LQ New Orleans, and the brilliantly titled sequel, "Daddy's Home 2," was ¿OPHG LQ 0DVVDFKXVHWWV -- but these one-dimensional, deeply neurotic and in some cases seriously disturbed characters might as well be dwelling on Asgard for all their connection to anything resembling the world in which we live.
Yes. I know this is a slapstick farce, with aspirations to follow in the broad comedy tradition of a "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation" RU HYHQ WKH ¿UVW +RPH Alone."
Key difference: Even when Clark Griswold creates havoc with his wildly over-the-top Christmas lights or Kevin McCallister comes up with Rube Goldberg contraptions to foil the Wet Bandits, we can relate to the hapless family man Clark or the forgotten, left-alone kid Kevin.
With the possible exception of one female character who is relegated to the deep background as the middle-aged, 60-something Boys-toMen hog the spotlight with their increasingly feeble and childish antics, nobody in "Daddy's Home 2" talks or behaves or goes through experiences most of us can emSDWKL]H ZLWK RU ¿QG HQtertaining) on any level.
"Daddy's Home 2" and "Bad Moms Christmas" actually travel remarkably (and depressingly) similar plot paths.
– In "Bad Moms Christmas," the mothers of the Bad Moms arrive just in time for the holidays, toting all sorts of family baggage and wreaking havoc on the lives of their daughters' families. One dominant grandparent insists on hosting a lavish, over-the-top Christmas celebration. Meanwhile, the grandchildren get caught up in the Affection Wars.
Oh, and before it's all over, the seeds are planted for a possible threequel set in Las Vegas.
– In "Daddy's Home 2," the fathers of the daddies arrive just in time for the holidays, toting all sorts of family baggage and wreaking havoc on the lives of their sons' families. One dominant grandparent insists on hosting a lavish, overthe-top Christmas celebration. Meanwhile, the grandchildren get caught up in the Affection Wars.
Oh, and before it's all over, the seeds are planted for a possible threequel set in Las Vegas.
Keep the eggnog coming; I'm dealing with a serious case of deja view.
Will Ferrell returns as the squishy, touchyfeely Brad, and Mark Wahlberg is back as the macho, outwardly gruff Dusty. Brad is married to Sara (Linda Cardellini, playing the closest thing to a normal human being in this movie), Dusty's ex-wife. Former rivals Brad and Dusty are now happily existing as coparents and best buddies.
Dusty is married to the spectacularly beautiful and always provocatively dressed Karen (Alessandra Ambrosio), who we're told is a very successful novelist. Even when Karen is in stiletto heels and neglects to wear a bra, she always has pen and pad in hand, so we know she's very serious about the whole novelist thing.
Mel Gibson hams it up (and scores a few laughs) as Kurt, Dusty's Marlboro Man of a dad -- a crude, rude, lewd former space shuttle pilot who shows up uninvited after being MIA for most of Dusty's adult life (not to mention his childhood).
John Lithgow is Brad's father, who's even more affectionate and sweet and childlike than Brad. When father and son see each other after mere weeks apart, they kiss on the lips for an uncomfortably long period of time.
See what's happening here? The grandpas are exaggerated versions of their grown sons!
Brad and Dusty and their extended families wind up spending the holidays in an enormous and luxurious mountain retreat, where all sorts of wacky hijinks ensue, and deep secrets are revealed. Oh boy.
Much of the "humor" in "Daddy's Home 2" is of questionable taste at best.
Karen's adolescent daughter, Adrianna (Didi Costine), and Sara's daughter, Megan (Scarlett Estevez), who is about 7 or 8, raid the spiked punch bowl, get drunk and stumble about giggling while the family re-creates the Nativity scene.
Kurt puts a loaded gun in little Megan's hands and takes her out to shoot turkeys. She wings Kurt and kills two birds, and then brags about it to the nurses in the hospital where Kurt is laid up. Really? REALLY?
There's also an amateurishly staged and downright bizarre musical number in which the parents and the grandparents and the kids joyously sing "Do They Know It's Christmas?" the 1984 classic written by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure and performed by an allstar collection of artists.
This was a song and a collaborative effort to raise awareness and generate funds to combat famine in Ethiopia.
It's nothing short of jarring to see everyone grinning madly and locking arms while characters take turns singing lyrics such as, "There's a world outside your window, and it's a world of dread and fear," and "the Christmas bells that ring there are the clanging chimes of doom."
All right. This time I'm POSITIVE we're not going to see a holiday comedy this sour and cynical and profoundly unfunny for a very long time.
At least that's my Christmas wish.