Review: Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son

Reviews

Strange Wilderness

Lazy, lazy, lazy

By BRETT MICHEL | February 6, 2008

0.5 Stars

HARK! That's Bigfoot behind you.

“We can’t find Bigfoot without a map!” Likewise, you can’t find laughs without jokes. This year-old effort from Adam Sandler’s production company finally sees the light of an empty theater. “Effort” may be a poor choice of word, however, since none seems to have been put into this slapdash stoner comedy written by former Saturday Night Live scribes Peter Gaulke and Fred Wolf and derived from their decade-old parody shorts. Case in point: the movie, directed (if that’s what you can call it) by Wolf, follows the sad attempt by wildlife TV host Peter Gaulke (Steve Zahn) and his soundman, Fred Wolf (Allen Covert), to save their ratings-starved show. That’s right, the duo couldn’t even be bothered to create names for their leads. Gaulke and Wolf (the fictional ones) set off for “Ecuador” (the entire lazy film was shot in Los Angeles), and they find the mythical beast with no problem. Gaulke and Wolf (the actual ones) might have greater difficulty saving their careers. 87 minutes | Boston Common + Fenway + Fresh Pond + Circle + suburbs

Related: Primary concerns, The Obliterati, Old gold, More

Topics: Reviews , Adam Sandler, Fred Wolf, Allen Covert, More

| More

See more deals

view all

[ 02/19 ] 4-9 pm | Tom Tom Sunday: Celebrating the Big Beat of Tom Ardolino @ The Met

[ 02/19 ] Mary Poppins @ Providence Performing Arts Center

[ 02/19 ] "Nostalgia Machines" @ David Winton Bell Gallery

ARTICLES BY BRETT MICHEL

REVIEW: THIS MEANS WAR | February 16, 2012
What promises to be a modern Jules and Jim (until you realize it's directed by a 43-year-old who calls himself "McG") quickly devolves into Spy vs. Spy territory, only with incompetently staged and edited action and little of that ol' Mad magazine zing.

REVIEW: THE VIRAL FACTOR | January 17, 2012
Made for a modest budget of $17 million — and feeling like it (who needs convincing explosions in an action movie?), Dante Lam's latest still gets the job done from a run-and-gun standpoint.

REVIEW: EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE | January 17, 2012
Too soon? For Stephen Daldry's 9/11 drama, the right time is "never."

REVIEW: THE DIVIDE | January 10, 2012
Many a teleplay for The Twilight Zone threatened atomic Armageddon, and though Frontier(s) director Xavier Gens nukes New York in the opening shots of his latest thriller, he finds more inspiration in the horrors of human nature as seen in the old TV show's episode "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street."

REVIEW: MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – GHOST PROTOCOL | December 20, 2011
Impossible Missions Force agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) returns to the screen in dramatic fashion as new teammate Jane (Paula Patton) and the returning Benji (Simon Pegg) break him out of a Russian prison.