The holiday season is upon us, and so is the batch of heartwarming comedies including Daddy’s Home 2, which was a fitting-yet-predictable way to commence the annual year-winding-down box office race.
Battling dads Brad (Will Ferrell) and Dusty (Mark Wahlberg) are back in this sequel to the original “Daddy’s Home.” From there, it looked like this would be another Christmas vacation taking a turn for the worst. At the airport pick-up in the beginning of the movie, they are greeted by their own fathers, the tougher and more of a “Hall of Fame action hero” played by Mel Gibson and the softer and cuddlier dad played by John Lithgow. They go to the ski resort cabin to stay during the holiday season, where havoc is about to happen.
The slapstick humor in this movie is through the roof in many different places. Hilarity ensued during the tube race where Brad loses his infant kid before he goes down the hill, crashes into a window and plummeted into the snow and his pants apparently came off in front of the audience.
There was a debate over the thermostat being turned up when they were trying to get sleep for the night. It was revealed to be Adrianna (The phone-fixated daughter) turning the heat where it would roast all night inside the cabin. That would definitely relate to ANYONE who dares to touch the thermostat and would face consequences for that.
However, the scene where she and Megan (the other kid in the movie) got drunk from spiked egg-nog was something that can really ruin a nativity scene, especially on Christmas Eve. This was followed by a snowball fight where, although the dads were fighting each other, they keep accidentally hitting Don (John Lithgow) by accident in a slapstick way.
The scene that puzzled me the most was when Megan accidentally shoots Gibson’s character when a turkey was approaching her. These are some of the points that didn’t really stand out for a comedy.
Throughout much of the movie, there are times that Will Ferrell was doing classic Will Ferrell things in this movie, which is why he is one of my biggest influences. He still has that spark to make an audience laugh, but this movie could be a sign he might be past his prime if he is still playing a basic character he would play. However, the father-and-son (Brad and Don) kissing, although hilarious for a certain age group, was a little cringe-worthy, to say the least.
Mark Wahlberg did a respectable job playing Dusty and his climax fight with Roger, played by John Cena, near the end proves that he still has his inner tough guy waiting to fight to save the world. Supermodel Alessandra Ambrosio was quite catty enough to play Dusty’s wife and she did not disappoint at acting like a snitch who turned out to be OK.
Linda Cardellini, who played Brad’s wife, typically looked like your quintessential worried-at-a-mall mother in this movie. But it was still a good performance nonetheless.
Kudos to Dylan (Dusty’s son) for overcoming his fears and getting his unexpected first kiss, scoring a ONE in the last frame of a bowling game, getting wired on coffee and becoming a hero for many girls (including his figurative crush) that kiss him because of his bravery in the end.
He played a bigger role in the movie than expected with everyone in the snowed-in movie theater were all singing along to celebrate Christmas although their trip to see a film went horribly awry.
With that said and done, I thought it was a good movie but was more of your cliche Christmas show that is aimed towards families with younger kids. This was a fine change of pace from darker flicks to the lighter ones just in time for the holiday season to begin, with some foibles. It’s no “Christmas Vacation,” “Home Alone” or “Elf,” however this would still be a fun watch for any family gathering during the holidays.
Final Score: 6.5/10 (It was decent, but still had the same flashes of a stereotypical Christmas family comedy. Still, for families with older kids and teens, I recommend you can watch it as one of the ways to celebrate the holidays).
Story by
Dan Lauper for SUU News
leroylauper@gmail.com
Photo courtesy of Paramount Pictures
