Image courtesy of www.impawards.com
Director :
John Whitesell
Cast :
Martin Lawrence……….Malcolm Turner
Elton LeBlanc……….Asst. Bingo Caller
Nia Long……….Sherry Pierce
Michelle Parylak……….JoAnne
Sarah Brown……….Constance Stone
Martin Lawrence seems to have a penchant for picking film roles that don’t showcase the sort of comedian he can be. Ever since Bad Boys has been a hit Lawrence has been in a number of bad movies. While he has still managed to be able to get people into the theatres, Lawrence is a prime example of being a talented comedian without the right sort of connections to vault into the sort of roles that Will Smith, amongst others, get on a regular basis. But he does make the best out of the worst, as his starring turn as an FBI Agent who goes undercover, Big Momma’s House, made $120 million just in domestic box office receipts off of a $30 million budget.
Lawrence is back as Malcolm Turner in Big Momma’s House 2. This time around, Turner has to foil yet another scheme. This one involves the usual sort of thing that has surrounded Lawrence’s career: unfunny sight gags, physical humor, and total misuse of the sort of comedic ability Lawrence has.
And it’s easy to see why Lawrence would be unfunny yet again. Lawrence is a blue humor comedian who is at his best when he lets loose the seven dirty words and some of the foulest jokes of any comedian working today. Put him in a PG-13 setting and take away his tools of the trade and he isn’t nearly as effective as he could be, that’s a given, but the key to Big Momma’s House 2 is that its even worse than the original.
How could it be worse than Big Momma’s House? For starters, it has a director that clearly has no idea what he’s doing with an extended story. Most of the film feels like a bad sitcom, just extended for almost 100 minutes as opposed to 22. John Whitesell’s directing credits have mainly been limited to television and it’s evident that making the transition from the small screen to the big screen is one he hasn’t got the talent for. Big Momma’s House 2 has many subplots that are either resolved way too quickly or are quickly forgotten; there’s a larger story to be told and Whitesell wants to tell it in a chapter form when a novelette is more relevant. It’s something with more experience in film that he can develop, but for now he’s stuck with a film that tries to be many things and fails at them all.
And the film does have a lot of good concepts and some good character work that could’ve been done. Nia Long, as Malcolm’s wife Sherry, really isn’t given too much to do other than be the usual pouting wife. There’s a raunchy action comedy waiting to come out of this, as there is a lot that could’ve been done, but the script settles for cheap gags when a bit more work with satire would’ve been a better payoff.
