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Grown Ups

I liked it for the light summer flick that it was. There were good jokes from beginning to end and it was cute the way the actors truly seemed to laugh and have a good time from all the ribbing.

Structure / Plot and Character

- I would have liked more drama as this could have been a memorable comedy-with-heart like City Slickers. Sandler’s issue was his pampered life and spoiled kids, yet the kids part was resolved midway through the story and not through a specific act on his part. Taking them to the cabin was the just the beginning. The scene where he watched his son pick up a rock and wished that he would throw it should have been action- showing his son how to skip it across the lake.

At the end of Act II, Sandler’s wife ripped into him for his habit of lying, but that never seemed like the big deal she made it out to be (and, again, the clear focus was on his spoiled life). Also, her own attitude changed because of the stay in the cabin so his lie about that was a good one, so to speak.

- Chris Rock’s issue was clear, though there was room to go a little deeper. Rob Schneider’s story was never clear…he said there was a problem in his relationship with his daughters, yet they arrived and all was fine between them. He snapped at his current wife (as he did with his past wives), then immediately made up with her…what changed in him needed to be seen. That’s the missing drama!

David Spade’s story missed a crucial part: in the cabin that night when all the couples danced and he was drunk, Spade should have had a moment of looking at the happy couples with regret. Finally, Kevin James’s thread was awful as there was no clue to the issue that was mentioned at the end, him faking success.

Other

The marketing department got this all wrong. The title, poster and a few seconds of a commercial (I change the channel at movie commercials and avoid most previews) made it seem like these were guys who had still not matured and that was not the case (except for Spade).

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