The Guilt Trip

And the Oscar for "Best Fish Out of Water" goes to...

Grade: B -
Director: Anne Fletcher
Starring: Barbra Streisand and Seth Rogan
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Running Time: 1 hr. 35 min.

There’s two target audiences for The Guilt Trip: menopausal moms who don’t think their adult kids visit enough, and Barbra Streisand fans (Overlap Alert...). However, the one group of moviegoers who may as well stay away are Seth Rogan fans, because as a safe, convivial holiday diversion, The Guilt Trip is anything but a guilty pleasure.

Directed without imagination by Anne Fletcher (the equally unimaginative murderous row of Step Up, 27 Dresses, and The Proposal), the film is ultimately another variation on that time-tested film genre: the road movie. Andy Brewster (Rogan) is a single schlub with a love for science but no ability to convert that into a career—no word why he doesn’t just become, I dunno, a scientist. Andy has manufactured an organic cleaning dynamo he’s labeled “Scioclean,” but his wonky sales pitch is leaving potential retailers cold. Never mind that we never actually see Scioclean clean anything...Andy assures us it’s the best thing out there because, well, you can drink it.

One a trip home to New Jersey, Andy hears a story about the first love that got away from his longtime widowed mom Joyce (Streisand). Andy invites his mom on a cross-country sales trip under the guise of wanting to spend more time with her. Unbeknownst to her, Andy has tracked her old beau to San Francisco, the final stop on their trek.

Lots of kvetching and overbearing ensues, yet Streisand—ever the pro—and Rogan display a surprising level of chemistry that carries the film through many dead spots and narrative lapses. An opening credits computer screen shot reveals Andy has less than $800 in his bank account, yet either he’s able to rent a car and pay for food and lodging from coast to coast or Joyce is paying for everything, which really calls into question the unspoken reason why Andy invited his mom along for the ride. Andy is repeatedly told he needs to change the name of his product...except he really doesn’t. Joyce chastises Andy’s use of any swear words...until she lets loose a stream of profanity after Andy talks back to her one night. Joyce tells Andy to never pick up hitchhikers, at least until...well, you get the idea.

The film teeters on tedium whenever it detours off the beaten path, like Joyce’s drunken night at a road bar or her attempt to win a free meal by scarfing down a 50-ounce steak in an hour. Fortunately, the bulk of the film comprises some sharp byplay between Streisand and Rogan, and there’s a late reveal that salvages a modicum of pathos. The Guilt Trip isn’t an Apatow apparition, and its target audiences wouldn’t have it any other way.

Little Fockers

Sir, this isn't Little Italy and my name isn't Marty

Grade: C

Director: Paul Weitz

Starring: Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Owen Wilson, Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand, Blythe Danner, Teri Polo, and Jessica Alba

MPAA Rating: PG-13

Running Time: 1 hour, 38 minutes

The only character that utters anything approaching common sense in Little Fockers, – the tertiary installment in the Meet the… series – is Dr. Bob Banks (Tom McCarthy), appearing for the first time since Meet the Parents. In explaining his infidelity to wife Debbie, the daughter of curmudgeonly patriarch Jack Byrnes (Robert De Niro), Bob claims it was his only way out of Jack’s “circle of trust” and off the Jack Byrnes hamster wheel.

If only the rest of us could buy a ticket on that ride. Like its older cast members, Little Fockers is past its prime and quickly runs out of steam. Plagued by health problems and Dr. Bob’s letdown, Jack turns to Greg Focker (Ben Stiller) as successor to the familial throne. As always, however, Jack lets his chronic paranoia get the best of him, particularly when Nurse Greg starts hanging out with a flirtatious drug rep (Jessica Alba) hawking a new erectile dysfunction pill.

Reprising Kevin Rawley – the New Agey, obsessive ex-beau of Pam Focker – Owen Wilson enjoys his largest role in the series and repeatedly saves dead weight scenes. On the other hand, Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand essentially give glorified cameos as Greg’s parents – indeed, Hoffman initially refused to appear in the film because of disagreements over script and replacing director Jay Roach with Paul Weitz (About a Boy).

Otherwise, Little Fockers is the same exasperating collection of miscommunications and crippling family dysfunction, capped by a final tack-on scene shamelessly and sloppily designed to overhaul this mess into a holiday film – the ribbon and bow adorning the film’s ad poster is part of the same stupid masquerade. Each plot point circles back to Jack and Greg’s tiresome tete-à-tete, even though any modicum of basic human communication would defuse every conflict.

There one moment of knowing hilarity when Jack calls into CIA headquarters to dust off his top-secret clearance. The incredulous phone operator tells Jack he can probably just find whatever he’s looking for using Google, an amusing nod to our open information age. Conversely, a scene in which De Niro and Harvey Keitel get into a shouting match only reminds you of the better films each of them once appeared in together. Chances are none of them featured De Niro pitching a tent in his pajamas.

Neil Morris