Brief Story Line
Brian Jennings (Kevin James - Hubie Halloween, Paul Blart: Mall Cop etc) was a forensic accountant who just got laid-off from the company he worked for. His wife Emily (Sarah Chalke - The Wrong Missy, Roseanne TV series etc) decided to return to work as lawyer, leaving Brian to be a stay-home dad and taking care of his step son Lucas (Benjamin Pajak - The Life of Chuck etc). On their first time spending the day together, Brian and Lucas went to the park and met with single dad Jeff (Alan Ritchson - The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, Reacher TV series etc) who was playing with his son CJ (Banks Pierce).
Jeff who was full of energy immediately befriended Brian and insisted the four of them to have playdate. However their supposedly fun day became dangerous when mercenaries starting to chase them. It would be revealed later that they were working for wealthy business man Simon Maddox (Alan Tudyk - Creature Commandos TV series, Strange World etc). Brian and Lucas who were caught up in the mess had no choice but to went along with Jeff and CJ while trying to evade the capture and save themselves.
So what was the reason Jeff and CJ being pursued and how would the story conclude? You could find out in this movie.
End of Brief Story Line
Action comedy is one of the genre that I favored a lot as it usually is fun and mostly entertaining. With the cast like Alan Ritchson who has made a name for himself in the past few years, plus the large experience of Kevin James in comedic roles, certainly made me had high hopes. Besides the premise also sounded interesting. Frankly the opening scenes looked promising with some usual humor from Kevin James who still could provide plenty of comedy. But as the story progressed it did not look good. Even when Alan Ritchson appeared, I thought the connection felt a bit forced. Luckily it was better when dangerous people started to chase after them and the action was shown more as it made the film more enjoyable.
Plot wise was definitely not the plus point here, as was the story telling which felt chaotic but not in a good way. Not sure whether it was because I was too tired from all the walking yesterday, but I found the film not really entertaining and sometimes boring. The ending was predictable with some rather absurd climax, though I did not expect too much after what I saw in the mid to its closure. There were at least some funny bloopers during the closing credit, with a mid end credit scene that tease a sequel. However, I thought it would be really surprising if they did make it in future.
The cast were OK, particularly Alan Ritchson who did his best in showing that he could be more than just action hero, while Kevin James was his usual self. Critics seemed to enjoy Ritchson performance and praised him here, but they really hated the film as a whole. Now other cast were rather disappointing to me, except perhaps newcomer Banks Pierce who looked realistic in his characterization. In addition to the above, there were also appearances of Isla Fisher (Now You See Me: Now You Don't, Godmothered etc) as one of the Mama Mafia named Leslie, Stephen Root (The Wrecking Crew, Perry Mason TV series etc) as Gordon, Hiro Kanagawa (Orphan: First Kill, iZombie TV series etc) as Jeff's former superior Colonel Kurtz and Paul Walter Hauser (The Naked Gun 2025 sequel, Cruella etc) in uncredited cameo as Galifinakish. Sadly all of them were poorly written and made me did not appreciate them here.
The film itself was directed by Luke Greenfield whose prior works included Half Brothers, The Girl Next Door (there was a funny thing related to this one in this movie) and several others. It was written by Neil Goldman (writer of some episodes of Scrubs, Shrinking TV series etc). Unfortunately I think with critics unimpressed with this movie, it would not be great addition to Greenfield and Goldman's portfolio. However, audience seemed to be more positive as it made Number One in the US on its week of release and also Top 10 in Indonesia.
Overall I was hoping for a better buddy action comedy and though I am usually OK with poor quality of writing/directing as long as the comedy was fun and action was spectacular, I could not help feeling this to be a big miss. Yes sometimes I could smile a bit on certain part but mostly I was not too happy, while the action did not disappoint but the climax was not great. Too bad the additional names like Isla Fisher and Stephen Root did not help in making this entertaining either. So if you just want to see Ritchson in different role working together with comedy actor Kevin James plus a little bit of action here and there, then you can give this a try. However, do not expect the movie to be high quality action comedy.
Mike's movie moments rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
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