Date Movie parodies scores of romantic comedy flicks that include My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Hitch, My Best Friend's Wedding, Meet the Fockers, When Harry Met Sally, Wedding Crashers and more. There are also random spoofings such as the Paris Hilton Carl's Jr. TV commercial and Napoleon Dynamite. The cast includes Alyson Hannigan, Adam Campbell, Eddie Griffin, Jennifer Coolidge and Fred Willard.
Sitting in a theater watching Date Movie isn't all that different from sitting in a theater watching Munich. The audience sits in dead silence, emotions running high as the images flicker before their eyes. Of course, the type of emotional connection is different. This one is more of a feeling of intense loss over the hour and a half of your life that is slipping away. Gone forever. That $20 bucks that could have been spent in so many better ways. Paper airplanes, for example. Maybe a bonfire.
There is not a single funny moment in Date Movie. Each joke falls flatter than the one that preceded it. The jokes are so incredibly uninventive, I'd bet that any audience member could think of funnier bits off the top of their heads. At the opening, Hannigan is in a fat suit, jumping and dancing around for no particular reason to that godawful Milkshake song by Kelis. Wow, person in a fat suit, greeeaaat. That was pretty funny the first time I saw it, when "Weird" Al Yankovic did it 15 years ago. Other knee-slappers include a Napoleon Dynamite parody. Of course, I'm not sure if you can call it a parody since the sequence is simply a guy dressed like Napoleon Dynamite. Oh, but wait, his shirt says "Don't Vote For Pedro." Ah, now I get it. Hardy @$#$in' Har. The guy that Hannigan's character, Julia, meets and falls for is named Grant Fonckyerdoder. Boy, I hope the writers didn't think too long on that one.
It's absolutely baffling to figure out how the movie was written, funded and directed by someone. It doesn't surprise me that someone could think this is a good idea. There are plenty of untalented people out there. What's frightening is that they were able to gather enough other untalented people to make it into a major theatrical release. To be fair, you can't blame the cast. They should fire their agents, but you can't blame them. Except maybe for Eddie Griffin. He's done enough of this crap by now to know better. For shame, Eddie, for shame.
Date Movie is written, directed and executive-produced by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. The ads for Date Movie semi-amusingly claim it to be from 2 of the 6 writers of Scary Movie. In point of fact, after sitting through the film, that claim is just as dubious as it sounds. It's not funny, but sad. Further research reveals that these two also wrote the original story for another above-mentioned spoof stinker, Spy Hard. Time for a new line of work guys.
If there is only one movie playing at your local theater and it's Date Movie, do nothing. Stare at a wall. Punch your friend (or yourself) in the testicles for an hour and a half. Trust me, it's less painful. Smack your head into a pole. Those colorful spots that result will be more entertaining. Trust me, folks, I really can't overstate here, this movie is painfully bad. It's impossible to sit through without a few brain cells popping in your head. Do anything else this weekend, but please don't support this movie. If you do make the ultimate grave mistake of dragging your date to this movie, you'll owe her a lifetime of sappy romantic flicks in return.
0/0 Stars