Classic Movie Review Calendar Girl

Calendar Girl (1993) 

Directed by John Whitesell 

Written by Paul Shapiro 

Starring Jason Priestley, Jerry O'Connell, Gabriel Olds, Joe Pantoliano, Steve Railsback 

Release Date September 3rd, 1993

Published September 6th, 2023 

Three teenage creeps decide to drive up to the home of a movie star because they believe she will have sex with them if they explain that they have been fans of hers for years. That's the premise of a comedy in which these three creeps are treated like harmless scamps on an adventure. Watching the movie Calendar Girl is a bleak reminder of how much our culture has dehumanized Marilyn Monroe and normalized any and all male desires as harmless parts of being a man. I'm going to be told that I am taking this too seriously and if you're the one saying that, you should keep reading, you have a lot to learn. 

Calendar Girls stars Jason Priestley as Roy Darpinian, a troubled teenager with a distant father (Steve Railsback), who works as debt collector for the local mob. Roy is about to join the army and has only a few days before he leaves.  Roy wants to spend these last few days with his best school pals, Ned (Gabriel Olds), and Dood (Jerry O'Connell). The three pals facing down having to get started on life post-High School decide a road trip in order. That road trip just happens to be a trip to Hollywood and a stop at Marilyn Monroe's house. 

Ned, though the most bland of these three white bread dorks, is possibly the biggest creep. He carries around a bible with him wherever he goes. Nothing wrong with that except that it is not an actual bible. Rather, it's a serial killer level collage of photos and details about the life of Marilyn Monroe. So extensive is Ned's obsession with Marilyn that he has somehow located her actual home address. With no one to tell them not to, as this is a fully consequence free universe, the three friends steal a car and head to Hollywood. 

There is an old proverb about a dog chasing a car and the ultimate question: what will the dog do if he actually caught the car? This is an apt analogy for our three moronic protagonists in Calendar Girl. What do they do when they meet Marilyn Monroe? What is the ultimate goal? According to Roy, they 'Canoe' her. I'm not having a stroke here, I'm not mishearing something, that's what the character played by Jason Priestley makes very clear. He believes that he and his friends should 'Canoe' Marilyn Monroe. Those who take things literally are very confused right now. Do they want to take her on a canoe trip? No, they most assuredly do not want that. 

No, for reasons that have broken my brain since I saw this abysmal movie, to 'Canoe' is to have sex. Roy believes that these three men who have never met Marilyn Monroe should have the goal of having sex with her when they meet her. He lays out how vulnerable Marilyn is having recently been fired from a movie and having recently parted ways with husband Henry Miller. It's the perfect time for three teenage creeps to go to her house and convince her to have sex with them. And somehow, a group of people made a movie with this concept and treat this idea as if it were a wacky, good-natured, adventure. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review: Big Momma's House Like Father Like Son

Big Momma's House Like Father Like Son (2011) 

Directed by John Whitesell

Written by Matthew Fogel, Don Rhymer

Starring Martin Lawrence, Brandon T. Jackson, Jessica Lewis 

Release Date February 18th, 2011 

Published February 19th, 2011

Aside from innumerable insults to director John Whitesell, star Martin Lawrence, screenwriters Matthew Fogel and Don Rhymer and a sympathetic shake of the head for young comic Brandon T. Jackson, what is their left to offer to the movie “Big Momma's Like Father, Like Son?” This is a movie of ungodly awfulness and yet pointing that out seems unnecessary because everyone, the creators included, knew that would be the case going in.

The futility of reviewing this travesty of good intentions and PG rated oddity is off the charts. Critics have been rendered irrelevant by movies before (I am looking at you Sandler) but rarely have so many of us been left with so little to say about a movie than what we have left to say about “Big Momma's Like Father, Like Son:” Everyone knew this movie was going to stink out loud.

Now, I can already hear the catcalls about 'critical objectivity' and 'not forming an opinion before you see a movie' so let me put that to bed; in the day and age of mass marketing and the internet, it is nearly impossible, even for the most professional of professional critics, not to make certain judgments about a movie before seeing it. To not be exposed to certain aspects of a film before seeing it the critic would have to live under a rock and even then, as Geico pointed out in rather brilliant recent commercial, some information is simply unavoidable.

Do you really want a plot description? Really? Okay; FBI Agent Malcolm Turner is back in his Big Momma get up after his idiot stepson Trent (Brandon T. Jackson) ambushes him while on a stake out and ends up witnessing a murder. Now, not only will Malcolm be hiding out in drag, so will Trent, in the guise of Charmaine.

Malcolm and Trent, as Big Momma and her grand-niece Charmaine, hide out at an All Girls Arts College in Atlanta. There, the recent murder victim has hidden a key piece of evidence against his murderer. Naturally, the setting will invite all sorts of awkward comic situations and for Trent a love interest, a singer named Haley (Jessica Lucas).

What? No love interest for Malcolm? Nope, he remains married according to the storyline began in the first Big Momma movie but in a move that can only be described as a great act of charity to actress Nia Long, Mrs. Turner is conveniently dispatched to some place where she can't even be reached by phone.

No such luck for comedian Faizon Love who gets the unfortunate task of being Big Momma's love interest, a College security guard that Malcolm/Big Momma must keep interested if he is going to get close to that key piece of evidence he needs. Also sacrificed to this awful story; rising star Portia Doubleday (Youth in Revolt) as the school bitch and Michelle Ang as the school basket case.

If the murder plot weren't convoluted and tired enough “Big Momma's Like Father, Like Son” also pauses repeatedly for some seriously awful musical interludes. Trent is a wannabe rapper, calling himself the Prodigee(?), and he offers up some of the lamest PG raps since Will Smith gave up the moniker Fresh Prince. 

Jessica Lucas has a pleasant but unspectacular voice, think Norah Jones minus a soul, which gets far too much screen-time in “Big Momma's Like Father, Like Son.” Why? Because, director John Whitesell has a bizarre notion that this comic, lowbrow murder mystery should also be a PG rated tract defending the arts. No, I'm not making that up. 

”Big Momma's Like Father, Like Son” morphs Martin Lawrence's Big Momma franchise into a quasi-Disney Channel movie where education and the arts are given equal weight against a goofabout murder mystery plot. Good intentions run alongside a surprisingly puritanical vibe interrupted only by Love's disturbing lust for Big Momma and Trent's occasionally lascivious longings for his fellow students. 

The goody goody-ness of “Big Momma's Like Father, Like Son” serves as some sort of attempt at earnestness as a defense against critics like me. I am apparently supposed to reward the film for having moral fiber rather than simply trashing it for being a wholly awful exercise in filmmaking. Well, tough break kids. 

No, mere good intentions cannot justify such a slothful effort. “Big Momma's Like Father, Like Son” is far too slapdash and insignificant to get a pass because it has high ideals. I appreciate that the filmmakers wanted to make a nice point about education and the arts but they needed to do it while making a good movie and they simply did not.

Movie Review: Big Momma's House 2

Big Momma's House 2 (2006) 

Directed by John Whitesell

Written by Don Rhymer 

Starring Martin Lawrence, Nia Long, Dan Lauria, Kat Dennings, Chloe Grace Moretz, Zachary Levi 

Release Date January 27th, 2006 

Published January 26th, 2006 

2000's Big Momma's House helped to establish Martin Lawrence's star credentials. Unfortunately for Martin it was his last hit as a solo act. Bad Boys 2 owes far more to audience love for Will Smith than for anything Lawrence brought to the table. So, given a string of massive bombs on his resume, it comes as no surprise that Lawrence would make a return to trip to Big Momma's House.

What is surprising, however, is how pleasant--even occasionally funny--that return is. Don't get me wrong, Big Momma's House 2 is not a very good movie, but it is a passable bit of entertainment for very forgiving audiences.

Since we last saw FBI agent Malcolm Turner (Martin Lawrence), he has married Sherrie (Nia Long), the woman whose life he saved by posing as her Big Momma six years ago, and settled into a comfortable desk job. His new duties are far less dangerous than undercover work and include dressing up as an eagle to teach safety classes to school children, as we see in a cute opening sequence that has Malcolm lighting himself on fire while teaching kids fire safety.

Soon however, Malcolm is desperate to get back in the field. His former partner, no longer played by Paul Giamatti, has been killed in the line of duty and Malcolm wants the case. His boss (Dan Lauria) refuses to let him in but of course, as the plot insists, Malcolm will not be denied.

The investigation requires sending an undercover agent into the home of a computer software designer and his family as a nanny. Lucky for Malcolm, he has just the nanny to fit the job. Pulling his Big Momma mask and fat suit out of storage, Malcolm embeds himself; deep cover into a case involving corrupt software designers and a virus that could endanger national security.

Do not trouble yourself with the plot of Big Momma's House 2 because the film never troubles itself with the plot. The whole software/computer virus is merely the mcguffin. It's a reason to get Martin Lawrence back in his Big Momma disguise, dispensing off-color wisdom and, in this cleaned up family sequel, helping the children of this very uptight famly to loosen up and have more fun.

There is nothing original in the film's life lessons and family values storyline so you're left to watch Lawrence, who mugs with fury and somehow manages to find a big laugh here and there. Forget about the ridiculous suit. There is no way anyone bought it the first time around, and as Big Momma parades about in swimwear and cheerleader outfits, they certainly won't buy it this time. What you can buy into, however, is Lawrence's comic talent which, even in his worst films has shown through occasionally, and is in full view here.

I wouldn't call anything in Big Momma's House 2 clever, but some of it is pretty funny and that falls entirely to Martin Lawrence. Returning to the kind of broad comic performance that made him a star, Lawrence has his confidence and charm back. Since all of the laughs in Big Momma's House 2 rely on Lawrence's hard work and comic talent, having him at his cocky confident best is essential and the film works, in it's way, because of that.

There is nothing special about Big Momma's House 2, but get Martin Lawrence in that fat suit, maybe slip a swim suit over the top of it, throw in some fat jokes and some southern fried common sense and you get Big Momma.  It's a character that establishes its own level of reality--if you are willing to take on the herculean task of suspending disbelief.

For family audiences, Big Momma's House 2 is the kind of movie that kids will enjoy and mom and dad won't be bored by. Go in with low expectations and you may find yourself reasonably well entertained. Though the film is PG-13 for some occasionally raunchy humor, it's rare and nothing terribly offensive. Mom and dad can take the kids to see it without fear.

It's not for everybody, but fans of Martin Lawrence and the very forgiving amongst us will find more than a few big laughs in Big Momma's House 2.