Anne Fletcher, who directed the poorly reviewed, but well-cast and quite funny box-office hit The Proposal, is the nice lady in charge of directing Streisand in her first starring role in 16 years. Seth Rogen stars as her son...at first they seem like a weird combination...who knows?...maybe they still are a weird combination, but as I watched the movie I got used to it. Eventually I was willing to accept that Barbra may have given birth to Seth Rogen.
The premise is pretty simple. Rogen plays Andy Brewster, an inventor who is traveling across the country to show off his fancy, scientific, and non-toxic cleaning spray. Yep, that is a major plot point...something else that I had to accept. Andy asks his widowed mother Joyce to come along for the ride, because it is pretty obvious that everything in life is more enjoyable if you do it with Barbra Streisand. The truth is that Andy wants his mother to see the man whom she fell in love with before marrying Andy's father and whom she has not seen in decades. Throughout the film all sorts of crazy and random things happen, including seeing the Grand Canyon, Barbra eating a gigantic piece of steak, and stumbling upon an exotic dancer who happens to be a car expert.
To be completely honest the two leads have very little to work with. Naturally, the plot is pretty thin, but with a better script, it could have been much more entertaining. The movie was severely lacking jokes. When someone does decide to crack a joke it is often amusing, but was probably already used in the trailer. Also, I am pretty indifferent to Seth Rogen, but he was not obnoxious or gross in this, so he did not bother me. As far as Barbra Streisand goes, I wish she had channeled a little bit of "Roz Focker," from Meet the Fockers and Little Fockers. By the way she is the only part of the last one that is not horrifying crappy and awful. That character was just crazy and hilarious to me and I loved her with Dustin Hoffman. Lastly, I felt that her previous two starring roles, both from the 1990s (Prince of Tides and The Mirror Has Two Faces) displayed her acting abilities more. However, my favorite scenes with her in The Guilt Trip involved her crying and dropping the token f-word in this PG-13 movie.
The film also needed a better supporting cast...or a supporting cast at all. Rogen and Streisand are to my knowledge in every single scene of this movie and they can only do so much with the lines they are given. The Proposal benefitted from a great supporting cast, especially the scene stealing Betty White. The Guilt Trip on the other hand has other actors who serve no purpose in the whole of the film, but merely fill a couple minutes of screen time and are never heard from again.
I do love Barbra Streisand...but I'm going to give this 1 1/2 out 4 stars. It is infinitely better than Little Fockers, like most things in life are. It is not a terrible movie, mainly because I did not leave the theater infuriated and I did get to see Barbra Streisand on the big screen. However, it is not as funny as it should have and could have been and the plot was not the strongest. Most people who read this blog probably won't even watch this...since this is definitely geared toward older people or perhaps parents. But if you like either or both of the leads...then obviously you should Redbox it for a dollar or so.
-Joseph Sbrilli
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