Grandma's Boy Review
by samseescinema (sammeriam AT comcast DOT net)January 12th, 2006
Grandma's Boy
reviewed by Sam Osborn of www.samseescinema.com
rating: 2 out of 4
Director: Nicholaus Goossen
Cast: Linda Cardellini, Allen Covert
Screenplay: Barry Wernick, Allen Covert, Nick Swardson
MPAA Classification: R (for drug use and language throughout, strong crude and sexual humor, and nudity)
With one part insulting condescension, two parts stupidity, and a final part unabashed heart, Grandma's Boy is another emblematic outing for Happy Madison Productions. The film orbits around the innately childish life of video game tester, Alex (Allen Covert), and the zany realisms of bunking with Grandma Lilly (Doris Roberts) and her two friends, Grace (Shirley Jones) and Bea (Shirley Knight). It's a tried and true formula: pitting one generation against another and witnessing the expected frenzy unfold. But Grandma's Boy attempts to do this honestly; with supposed truths about the young generation of gamers and the last generation's practical conventions butting heads. But the film rams itself headlong into stereotypes, defining each character with single, disgraceful traits, and misfiring its portrayal of gamers with slighting aloofness.
Video Games are an emerging art form. Where film infuses modicums of music, literature, and visual art to form its medium, video games try similarly with human interaction. And although they've, as of yet, failed to find a market outside of flurried violence and badly used language, I believe that eventually video games will heighten into another valid medium of art, with dimensional characters and fully realized storylines for gamers to experience. Grandma's Boy touted itself as the shining knight for these video games, and was marketed as the film to advocate they're presence in this generation's lives. Instead, Grandma's Boy presents its gamer audience with idiots and social misnomers posing as characters. The glazed over, desperately virginal, and socially misfit image of a video gamer is epitomized by this film. Grandma's Boy doesn't do gamers justice, but ignorantly condescends to them, offering only stereotypical characters written solely for the jokes they spew. And without any realistic subtext for these stereotypes, their jokes fall thankfully flat.
But for all the nonsensical ignorance the film spouts, its anti-hero, Alex, at least has a heart. It may be buried beneath multiple layers of hash, alcohol, and poorly laid sex jokes, but, unlike the rest of Grandma's Boy's characters, Alex could walk down the street without being forced into an insane asylum. There even lies a semi-heartfelt romance in between the two parts stupidity and one part insulting condescension. Samantha (Linda Cardellini), the development supervisor for Eternal Death Slayer 3, the game Alex is testing, sprouts some sympathy for Alex's embarrassing housing situation with Grandma Lilly. The two go out on a celebratory business dinner, accidentally get Grandma Lilly stoned, and launch a wild, drunken party at her house. The sparks eventually fly and our two uniquely believable characters find each others' lips. The scenes aren't especially inspired, but offer some refreshing solace from the rest of the film's static immaturity.
Is Grandma's Boy really all that bad? Well, no. In truth, it has its overtly funny moments, elevating it past other Adam Sandler production duds like The Hot Chick and The Longest Yard. But it doesn't have the strength to rise to the level of the great cinematic job portrayals like Sooper Troopers and Office Space. Grandma's Boy will fall flat with the critics and build a small, unfortunate following with twelve-year-old boys, leaving the rest of the gaming world to wait for its cinematic advocate, and also for the game ruining director Uwe Boll to be murdered in his sleep.
- reviewed by Sam Osborn of www.samseescinema.com
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
