Movie Review: Grown Ups 2 (English) 180

Three years after the first ‘Grown Ups’ movie, Lenny Feder (Adam Sandler) has joined his old friends Eric Lamensoff (Kevin James), Kurt McKenzie (Chris Rock) and Marcus Higgins (David Spade) after moving back to his hometown along with his wife Roxane (Salma Hayek) and kids. Soon, they need to deal with funny situations involving their old friends and the local college frat boys.

Looking at it critically, the film could have just begun anywhere and ended up nowhere! Wait, no story? Are you kidding me? How can a movie exist without a central plot or a conflict that works itself out in the end? Well, they do it in ‘Grown Ups 2’ which credits Adam Sandler as one of the writers!

The movie has numerous themes, like the issues of teenage kids of the lead characters who get into funny situations, a couple of them involving dating. Then, there are some gags involving accidents, baldness, farts, etc. which are not entirely unusual. And the kids and the grownups have a run-in with some college boys over the use of a secluded lake. And there’s a scene involving a funny car-wash!

‘Grown Ups 2’ has a massive star-cast. Along with those already mentioned here, there’s Twilight’s Taylor Lautner playing one of the frat boys, the tall basketball star Shaquille O’Neal playing a cop and there is wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin who has been cast as a former school bully with a sizzling girlfriend (April Rose) who doubles up as a ballet teacher to one of Lenny Feder’s kids.

The movie tries hard to be funny. Take that incident involving a heavily drugged bus driver using the bed and toilet on display at a K-mart. Another one involves Lamensoff’s lame gag that combines a burp, sneeze and a fart. A scene of a deer pissing on Sandler is extremely lame brand of humor. When you know that the film has Adam Sandler in it, you know the sort of humor that the film would have.

Nonetheless, ‘Grown Ups 2’ also has its funny moments too. Some of its original but adult humor involves the faux exercise routine for the film’s women. Also, the fact that Salma Hayek can pull of a glamorous role in her late forties is noteworthy! And the scene showing the attack by the Frat Boys led by Lautner, one tends to ask ‘Hey, why isn’t he turning into a werewolf?’

Verdict: Movies like ‘Grown Ups 2’ are those that are lazily made; imagine a movie without even a real plot. As such, it won’t make it worthwhile to visit to visit the big screen and pay big bucks. It has its share of fart jokes, but guess what, watching this film isn’t altogether regrettable either. You could as well enjoy this on a lazy weekend when there seems nothing better to do.


Rating 5/10: A funny pastime flick with tons of actors but without any real plot

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