***UPDATE: Armond White, whose need to be a contrarian bores me to death, loved Grown Ups and compared the film’s director Dennis Dugan to Renoir. His praise is a little hyperbolic — desperate for attention — but he at least gets the movie.
It’s fair to say Kyle Smith, one of the few right-of center critics out there, hated Grown Ups. He even accuses Sandler of begging for applause with the flag-raising scene. I think that’s unfair. The moment is really about how a family is coming together and to tell the audience it’s the 4th of July. The flag-raise is a story device to make a bigger dramatic point, not pandering. The scene’s quite short — a blip, really — and it’s not like Lee Greenwood’s singing in the background. The moment certainly caught my eye, but only in the sense of how refreshing it was to see this portrayed as the ordinary act it is for most of us. Hollywood’s succeeded at making such things feel so exotic that when what’s commonplace for a majority of Americans occurs on screen it can only be interpreted as a Big Message.
Currently “Grown Ups” sits at a pretty rotten 8% Tomatometer rating. With “Top Critics,” the story of 5 childhood friends now grown and gathering together for a funeral, rises to 11%. As Christian Toto pointed out, “the reviews aren’t pretty.” No, they are not. Many are downright hostile.
I love Adam Sandler, especially when he teams with director Dennis Dugan. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t made a bad movie, but as prolific as he is, Sandler’s track record when it comes to delivering for his fans is impressive. Especially now that he’s moved successfully beyond the rage-prone juvenile persona that made him famous and started playing family men. Until I came across James Rocchi’s review at MSN, however, my intentions were to rent this, especially since Big Hollywood had already posted a review. In his hostile review entitled “Grown Ups is Infantile Trash,” Rocchi closed with this enticing piece of information:
In the present moment, though, in the theater during “Grown Ups,” I felt a deep and abiding sadness every time the audience laughed and the sounds of their chuckles turned into the ringing of the cash register, and all I thought was a sad, simple truth: This, America, is why we can’t have nice things.
In other words, the audience was amused, the critic was not. That’s all I need to know. Within a few hours I was sitting in a packed house, munching popcorn, and laughing my ass off.
“Grown Ups” is very funny, holds your attention and delivers exactly what the trailer promises: an unpretentious, well-paced 100-minute comedy with a lot of heart and a few too many gross-out gags. It’s like “The Big Chill” but without all the baby-booming, self-involved intellectual masturbation (I’m a fan of “The Big Chill” but that doesn’t mean I’m blind to what it’s about.)
In 1978, Lenny (Sandler), Eric (Kevin James), Kurt (Chris Rock), Marcus (David Spade), and Rob (Rob Schneider) were 12 years old and thanks to Coach “Buzzer,” local basketball champions. 32 years later the five friends have spread to the four winds but are brought together again for their beloved Coach’s funeral.
Today, Lenny is a big-time Hollywood agent married to Salma Hayek and worried about his ridiculously spoiled kids who are on the verge of being forever ruined by all the narcissistic amenities that come with wealth and fame. Eric’s married to Maria Bello and in a gag that gets old pretty quick, has a 4 year old who still breast feeds. Kurt is henpecked, Marcus never grew past high school, and Rob has turned into an insufferable new age guru married to Joyce Van Patton (a superb and under-rated character actress), who’s at least thirty years older than he is.
Taste is purely subjective and to each their own. Some of the criticism, however, makes no logical sense. Many of the complaints stem from the fact that “Grown Ups” has no plot. Well, that’s true but neither did “The Big Chill.” Dugan’s film (co-written by Sandler and Fred Wolf) is built upon five subplots and the story turns come from the development of the characters. An over-arching story would’ve completely stripped the film of its primary charm and that’s the comfortable, friendly relationship between the five men. It’s their inter-action and camaraderie that makes “Grown Ups” a winner.
The other illogical criticism comes from those attacking the film as adolescent. Yeah, many of the jokes are childish but those jokes are not what the film is about. The film’s theme is actually a surprisingly mature one determined to remind us that what matters most in life are family and friends. As the 4th of July weekend passes and old and new relationships come to life, everyone eventually figures out — most especially the kids — that nannies and video games and fashion lines and trips to Milan and using the word maze instead of corn — that none of that phony Hollywood, pseudo-intellectual bullshit can compare to skipping a rock across a lake, a trip to a water park or fireworks on the 4th of July.
And how many movies today show family and friends gathered to raise the American flag on Independence Day? How many Big Stars allow their characters to wear the stars and stripes as though it’s no big deal — an everyday thing?
“Grown Ups” will make $40 million this weekend, and deserves to. My packed theatre not only laughed like Rocchi’s did, they applauded at the final fade.
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