Reviewed by Lamar Kukuk
4/7/07
Something very strange is
happening in Are We Done Yet?, the sequel to the 2005 hit Are
We There Yet?, and it's not the fact that Columbia Pictures decided
to remake the Cary Grant classic Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House
as a sequel to an unrelated movie. Well, that is pretty strange,
but even stranger is the fact that 95% of the inspiration both behind and
in front of the camera is invested in a single supporting character who
didn't appear in either There or Blandings.
Six months after the events
of Are We There Yet?, Nick (Ice Cube) and Suzanne (Nia Long) are
married and living in his small apartment with her kids Lindsey (Aleisha
Allen) and Kevin (Philip Bolden). Nick's sold his sporting goods
store and is pursuing his dream of starting his own magazine, and thanks
to a large advance he's received toward the first issue, he can afford
to move his new family into their own house. Out in the country,
they're charmed by a house sold to them by Realtor Chuck (John C. McGinley).
Chuck tells them there's work to be done on the house and gives them the
number of a good contractor, but Nick wants to do the work himself.
Once the entire electrical system blows out, he's got to call that contractor,
who is... Chuck. And did I mention that he's also the local building
inspector? And a licensed midwife (and self-proclaimed “baby whisperer”)?
Soon enough, as the house needs one repair after another, Nick is at the
end of his rope and the Persons family starts coming apart.
I've never seen Are We
There Yet?: a big reason I didn't go was because the trailers
made little Lindsey and Kevin seem like such hateful Hellbeasts that no
amount of cliched comic misadventure was ever going to make me think Nick
should do anything but run screaming away from them and their mother.
Based upon the evidence available in the sequel, the only mistake I made
was thinking that he wasn't just as unlikable. In fact, the Persons
family is one of the most caustic, least interesting clans I can remember
a silly comedy asking me to root for. Nick gets one scene each to
“bond” with the kids late in the game, but the character reversals are
wildly unbelievable. I've no doubt that if there's a third “Are
We...?” flick, his kids will hate him just as much when it begins as
they have the last two times. Allen and Bolden do nothing to make
the nasty characters written for them the least bit likable, and Ice Cube,
such a gifted dramatic actor, flails madly trying to SELL! EVERY!
JOKE! Long is stuck with that most thankless of roles, the comedy
wife who's so “always right” that the movie doesn't dare give her anything
funny to do.
I often wonder why Hollywood
types are so interested in having their own magazines, but it's certainly
the reigning movie character fantasy of choice. The problem with
Nick's magazine subplot is that it's both wildly unbelievable and shamelessly
in love with Special Guest Star Earvin “Magic” Johnson: it seems
as though he plans to make an entire continuing magazine out of a single
interview with Magic, and people actually seem willing to pay him to do
it.
There are some cute gags
involving vicious wildlife (but what happened to that funny-looking fistfight
with a deer from the trailer?), but there is exactly one reason to see
this movie, and it's a doozy: McGinley's performance as the cleverly
conceived Chuck is priceless. Each of his professions comes with
a different hat (and an entirely different personality). Don't try
to pay Contractor Chuck while he's wearing his Inspector Chuck hat:
we call that a bribe! McGinley brings manic, delightful energy to
every scene he's in, and he even sells a big late-movie revelation about
his character that was stolen lock, stock and barrel from a famous John
Candy movie. Chuck is a wonderful creation bursting at the seams
with detail, from his dozens of careers to his 38-second NBA career to
his status as a backup for the US Power Walking team in the 1994 Goodwill
Games. That phrase alone is funnier than every single character attribute
given to the Persons family combined.
For Chuck alone, I'm glad
I saw Are We Done Yet?, but every other aspect of the movie is slipshod
and unfunny. It's unable to do anything with the home improvement
concept other than simply rattle off names of repairs and have Nick pitch
a fit that they must be done. And the dynamic of his sour, crumbling
family is as unfunny as it is uninteresting. For all the things it
does wrong, I should have hated Are We Done Yet? But then
I think of Chuck breaking into the “Dance of War” when Nick challenges
him to a fight and I just can't help but smile. |
