ARE WE DONE YET?
Director: Steve Carr Stars: Ice Cube, Nia Long, John C McGinley, Aleisha Allen, Philip Bolden, Jonathan Katz, Linda Kash
Reviewed by GREG KING
This notional and thoroughly unnecessary sequel to the dire Are We There Yet? is also a remake of the 1948 Cary Grant comedy Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House, which in itself provided the template for the Tom Hanks/Shelley Long comedy The Money Pit.
This film takes up a year after the road trip from hell of Are We There Yet? Nick (Ice Cube, from Barbershop, XXX - The Next Level, etc) has sold his sports card shop and married his girlfriend Suzanne (Nia Long), They have moved into his tiny apartment with her two kids (Aleisha Allen and Phillip Bolden). Suzanne announces that she is pregnant with twins.
Realising that the place is too cramped for this family, they decide to move to a larger place in the country. The two kids are initially reluctant to be displaced from the familiar comfort zone of the city, its malls, mobile phones, and friends. And what they initially think is their dream home in the country soon turns into a renovator’s worst nightmare that not only drains their finances but also puts a strain on the family relationships.
Are We Done Yet? is one of the dullest and most laboured comedies to emerge from Hollywood in many a year. What this film desperately needed was an injection of more physical comedy, with lots of pratfalls and people being hurt in humourous fashion. But alas, there are precious few laughs under the pedestrian direction from Steve Carr (Daddy Day Care, etc). Carr even wastes the comic potential of a trio of blind plumbers, whose antics fail to raise even a smirk.
In recent years, notorious former rapper Ice Cube has crossed over to the mainstream with these family friendly comedies, but it’s an ill fit given his intensity and complete lack of comic timing. He is woefully miscast here. John C McGinley (from Scrubs, etc) shamelessly steals virtually every scene with his over the top performance as Chuck, the overly annoying real estate agent, who just happens to be the local contractor for every little problem that befalls Nick’s house –dry rot, termites, electrical rewiring and new plumbing.
Are We Done Yet? I was ready to throw in the towel after the first ten, painfully laugh-free minutes. Why didn’t Nick just move into Suzanne’s house in the first place so we wouldn’t have to waste 80 minutes of our lives on this tripe?
1/2
Reviewed by PETER MALONE
This film is something of a relief after the torment of Are We There Yet? That was the film where Ice Cube, a sports store owner, clashed with two of the most obnoxious children ever to invade the screen (especially the girl) and had to drive them to meet their mother, Nia Long, with whom he fell in love, thus acquiring a wife and the two children. This road trip was one of the most excruciating on film as the children tricked, abused, upset Ice Cube.
Very popular in the US for its intended audience, the sequel has not drawn good reviews elsewhere. This film is an adaptation of the 1947 comedy, Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House with Cary Grant and Myna Loy – which was, in turn, adapted in 1986 as The Money Pit with Tom Hanks and Shelley Long.
This time round Ice Cube, with Nia Long pregnant with twins, plus the two horrors (actually this time the boy is not so bad, but she…!!!). They move to the country, are persuaded to buy a good looking house which, of course, has everything wrong with it. Slapstick and pratfalls, anger and humour are the order of the day as the house first falls to pieces and then is put back together again.
Ice Cube is now a long way from the ‘hood and his rapper days, settling into comfortable middle class mayhem.
There is one thing, depending on your sense of humour, which helps this film along. It is the performance of John C. McGinley as the real estate agent, all smiles and smarm. Then he turns up, with different hats, as the person responsible for everything else in the town, a different persona for each. He does it all with exuberance and versatility.
But, this is a comedy for its target audience – others probably should beware.
Reviewed by WENDY RAWADY
‘Are We Done Yet?’ was heard all around the theatre.
‘Based on’ seems to be a cop-out way of capitalising on an existing franchise without putting in too much effort to bring it up to entertainment level, and so it is with Are We Done Yet? the latest offering from Ice-Cube. The film is based on the Cary Grant wacky comedy, Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (Dir.: H.C. Potter – no, not THE Harry Potter – 1948) (which was also pillaged for Tom Hanks film, The Money Pit – ( Dir: Richard Benjamin, 1986). Honestly, where does it all end??? Sometimes I think there should be a moratorium on film-making until the audience completely exhausts the entertainment value of what is already out there on the shelves.
But let’s look at the positives of Ice-Cube’s offering. The house is the star. It is a magnificent building on a great patch of land and the gardener’s cottage alone is a beautiful construction in stone. Set in Portland again, just as the amusing Are We there Yet? now Nick is moving his adopted family to the country, because (predictably) the Nia Long character, Suzanne, is pregnant (and more predictably) with twins. The production is good but the script, by Hank Nelken, is appalling. Joke, beat, mug to camera, laugh, joke, beat etc. and that characters are verging on insanity and plumb the depths of sit-com stupidity. And that’s a sad thing, because Ice-Cube is one of the best actors around. Even the hokey deer and raccoon with rather el cheapo visual effects bombed out for me. The slapstick stuff would have Laurel and Hardy turning in their collective graves. Having said that, the ongoing gag of the character of ‘Chuck Mitchell Jnr.’ (John C. McGinley – Dr. Perry Cox in Scrubs, NBC’s comedy set in a hospital), the Eddie McGuire of Oregon, has some laughs, but, for the most part, they are predictable and lack the necessary charm and innocence to take them to the belly for a decent guffaw! McGinley is a consummate sit-com actor and is scenes could have taken better advantage of his ability to light up the screen with his huge goofy grin.
The children who were so cute in Are We There Yet? are now older and the features that so endeared us to them are now as awkward as any teenager, Nothing sits well in the story, and I wonder whether the writer or director did enough homework observing the real thing on This Old House or any of the myriad of DIY programmes on the How To and Lifestyle channels.
Having been totally damning here, I apologise to all the kids who may find it a hoot for the holidays. However, kids, you’d be better off saving your dollars for Spiderman or getting along to an arthouse cinema and catching something more intellectual. At least then you could do a ‘book report’ on it, as is the schoolie trend these days!
OK for the whole family though most parents will check their watches at about 30 minutes in and collectively groan ’Are we done yet….?’.