College Road Trip, 2008

College Road Trip, 2008
Director: Roger Kumble
Cast: Raven-Symone, Martin Lawrence, Kym Whitley



Stage: Home theatre, TV selection


College road trip in short: When an overachieving high school student decides to travel around the country to choose the perfect college, her overprotective cop father also decides to accompany her in order to keep her on the straight and narrow.


Preps: Hm, an evening at home, am half sick and looking for entertainment. I need to see what's on menu for tonight. Martin Lawrence might be a good selection.


Reality: Ehm.. I am terribly wrong. Martin Lawrence, least in this piece, is NOT a good selection for any night. This comedy is really underestimating the observers, the sense of humour might amuse an eight-year-old child. I mean, the scenes are badly played, the scenario/texts are awful, there is absolutely no way I buy the pig and the relationship between Lawrence and the magic pig.
Maybe in some sick reality I would once have written that it's a decent comedy. However, I cannot claim that. I hope that when I have kids they will also not like this sort of movies, not the ones, that are played so terribly. What it is with average directed american movies that they think the audience can buy anything? That anything is good enough for us..
Enough spitting, you get it, I don't like it. However, the movie touches an important part of one's life, getting your kid into college. For US citizen and many other countries, this is firstly, very expensive, secondly, you need to let your teenage child far far away (in most cases) and thirdly, it practically shows, what kind of a parent were you and if you feel threatened or frightened to leave the kid out alone, then you haven't been doing much of a job. In US college in most cases of average families means life time savings or if you got lucky and some auntie reminded you in her will. Otherwise, the prime colleges are usually very distant from an average family with average income. In this sense, Slovenia can still be called heaven, because education in college is free of charge and a lot of people are abusing the status. Nevertheless, the prime goal of this movie is supposed to be a devastated father, not willing to let go of his little girl, finding out she's an adult afterall and making bonds with the father (sadly, at the end of journey you get to spend with your folks anyway). Well, better late then never.
However, everything you see in this piece is a pure example of how not to show anything like this. You never feel the real interaction between the actors, exaggeration was the key to this movie's delivery. Lawrence isn't Jim Carey and he shouldn't try to play a clown like that. Jim at least has his perticular audience. In Lawrence's deal, he would need to decide what to be and not try to resemble top comics from this genre.


My personal rating: 1,0 (waste of time. Totally. Not even close to what I want to see in this kind of storyflow or genre).


College Road on IMDB

Nothing to lose, 1997

Nothing to lose, 1997
Director: Steve Oederkerk
Cast: Martin Lawrence, Tim Robbins





Nothing to lose in short: Nick Beam's life couldn't get any worse. He discovers he has been living a lie and is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. So when T. Paul, a carjacker, attempts to rob him, it is the last straw for Nick. With everything to gain and nothing to lose, he kidnaps T. Paul and attempts to put his life back together.


Stage: home TV selection, Saturday night


Preps: None in perticular. But I have nothing more interesting to do, hence..


Reality: This kind of movies should be prohibited. There should be a test under which a movie rates high enough to enter TV selection. Nothing really close to a comedy. The story is not believable, but this isn't the only sin this movie is making. All sorts of mistakes and misbeliefs, but nothing can settle the initial problem the movie has. The drive. What is this man, after he discovers he's being betrayed, after? What will he do and why? The viewer should have the answers, not make them up as we go through the movie.
Martin Lawrence, as the role of the chimp monkey that waltzes around Robbins all the time, trying to get his attention or prove his intelligence and misfortune that drove him to be a robber. Quite predictable, with stupid delivery and unpersuading cast. Things that happen to them while they are on a road, could buy (maybe) a child, and by that I don't mean to be offensive towards children or underestimate their intelligence. But this piece definitely underestimates our intelligence. Hence, delete and forget forever. I can't believe this was on the prime time of the local TV.



My personal rating: 0 (yuk. don't waste your time)

Nothing to lose on IMDB

Big momma's house 2, 2006

Big momma's house 2, 2006
Director: John Whitesell
Cast: Martin Lawrence, Nia Long



Momma again in short: Martin Lawrence returns as FBI agent Malcolm Turner, a master of disguise who again goes deep undercover as the sassy septuagenarian "Big Momma." The FBI has learned that a computer software developer named Tom Fuller has created a computer virus that allows access to classified US government files, Fuller is planning to sell the virus to terrorist organizations all over the world. Upon hearing this, the FBI's best lead is Fuller's wife. So Malcolm goes undercover again as Big Momma in order to pose as Mrs. Fuller's nanny. and as always, Big Momma once again turns the house upside down.


Stage: Home TV selection, one week after Momma 1


Preps: one of my friends decides to come for a movie night. She needs to see a comedy. I wanted actually to check out Phone Booth again, a superb movie to my recall,. However, she persuades me this one will be great. Ok, I will submerge to her and not to my inner thoughts that this is one of the worst sequels of a bad comedy..


Reality: Hmmm, I am correct in my assumptions. The first part was a dissappointment, and so is this one. The comic scenes underestimate the spectator, the dialogue makes me feel stupid because I don't see the comedy in this. The story is taken out of the dumpster of scenarios, Nia Long plays a fool inlove, Martin Lawrence takes this cast probably because of lack of money.. all in all .. dissappointment.

Directors when putting down a sequel, should really consider the purpose of this. What was done in first part, that wasn't said there? Where is the niche for setting up a sequel? What will be this competitive edge that a sequel might bring to spectator to see the main difference and add value to the first part? Well, here this homework wasn't done at all. Again, the scenes with bringing up the image of Big Momma, are impressive (I wouldn't dare showing up 150 kg more than I have and still resemble the old lady. Lawrence (or the costumography team) does a great job here. I am impressed by this. However, this already happened in the first part. So, I need something more here. I carefully think about it.. but the movie is empty. The love story between Nia and Lawrence isn't believable, doesn't look genuine at all. The happening is unbelieavable, too (the flow of the story is just brought up in a second, like the director wouldn't even stop and think about it before putting it together).


Some of the scenes are still very funny, but they never make up for the time loss the spectator has. In my opinion, it's a no-no (the decision whether to watch this or not). If there wasn't for my friend (and she really enjoyed this), I would have turned this off long time before the end. So, don't see it if you have anything more enjoyable to do.


My personal rating: 2,0 (if you have something more important to do, do it :)

Momma on IMDB
Momma official site

Big momma's house, 2000

Big momma's house, 2000
Director: Raja Gosnell
Cast: Martin Lawrence, Nia Long, Paul Giamatti



Momma's synopsis: An FBI agent Malcolm Turner is going deep undercover as he disguise himself as Sherry Pierce's long-lost grandmother named Hattie Mae Pierce, aka Big Momma. And his latest assignment sends him to small-town Cartersville Georgia, where he is assigned to trap a brutal bank robber who they suspect will be coming down to visit his ex-girlfriend and her son, Trent. Now, Malcolm must somehow find a way to nab his criminal and the lady.


Stage: home TV selection (a really lazy evening and I needed something that smells like a comedy)


Preps: Once I remember seeing this, and I wasn't that thrilled, however, I needed some funny stuff so I was ready to choak or settle on something not so thrilling just to get some other things out of my head.


Reality: Worse than I remember. I remember at the time when this piece was created, there was this fame around Eddie Murphy and his sit-com's, his movies when he dressed up and his cast was cast of 8 actors (the nutty professor for instance is an example, from 1996). Anyhow, I got the feeling every person that considered himself as one of black really funny actors and resembled Eddie Murphy, wanted to do a piece that played around this topic. And of course, make big money out of the old idea - just for the sake of the argument, that crowd needs and loves such humour. Big momma's house is something like that. It has an unbelievable story, however, the make up and the dressing, resembling of big mommy by Martin Lawrence, is cute and in some cases, hilarious, funny so you could tremble and fall down. However, this is just in some cases and in some minutes of this movie.

These directors (that make such movies) and actors that are presented in this way, need to know that an old idea doesn't make a movie. And of course, not every actor can be like Eddie. Martin Lawrence is also a great comedian - I have seen some of his better times, and I remember Momma's house to be a big hit in Slovenia at the screening time. But I don't think that it's the type that would suit me. I don't like comedies that underestimate the viewer and this one, unfortunately, does just that.



My personal rating: 3,5 (I have seen more of my flat or refrigerator than this piece when watching it. Plus, the TV version makes you use the breaks they need for their commercials. Seriously, you won't miss a lot if you don't see it. However, there areat least a few really funny situations and some of the sit-com is really enjoyable.

Momma on IMDB