Failure to Launch Review
Posted by Jacob Ziegler on 03.10.2006
Failure to do a lot of things, like not suck...
FAILURE TO LAUNCH
March 8, 2006
Tripp: Matthew McConaughey
Paula: Sarah Jessica Parker
Kit: Zooey Deschanel
Ace: Justin Bartha
Demo: Bradley Cooper
Al: Terry Bradshaw
Sue: Kathy Bates
Paramount Pictures presents a film directed by Tom Dey. It was written by Tom J. Astle and Matt Ember. The running time is 97 minutes. It is rated PG-13 for sexual content, partial nudity and language.
BY JACOB ZIEGLER, 411Mania
"What are you doing?"
"We're press."
[Indignantly] "So what?"
Am I really that out of touch with the general movie going public? Two of my underlings at the video store I work at are simply appalled that I don't think Ryan Reynolds is one of film's greatest treasures, and it's been nearly impossible to land a copy of "Waiting" at my store for the last month or so.
Then just the other night I found myself in a crowded theater for a sneak preview of "Failure to Launch." As I sat through this insipid nonsense, I heard this odd sound coming from the audience – laughter. They were enjoying themselves, perhaps even having the time of their miserable lives. Why am I being so hostile toward the audience? Well, after being hassled by a few people when I and two other film critics walked in ahead of the crowd, because we're important and they're not, any sense of niceness I may have had was gone. I mean, was it really that important that THREE people walked in ahead of the crowd? Were we going to monopolize all the good seats for this major event in motion picture history?
But I digress. "Launch" pairs Matthew McConaughey, dusting off the same tired persona he used in "The Wedding Planner" and "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" with Sarah Jessica Parker, who will never again achieve the success she attained on "Sex and the City." If ever a couple looked more awkward together on screen, I can't remember it. Tripp and Paula they are named, and they clearly have no reason to be together.
Tripp, at 35 years old, still lives with his parents Sue and Al (Kathy Bates and Terry Bradshaw, who try very hard here). His mother cooks for him, does his laundry, and packs him a snack before he goes off on one of his many adventures. He is supposedly some kind of boat salesman, but there is only a brief glimpse of that shown. Most of the movie is spent in some kind of fantasy world, where he and his friends Ace (Justin Bartha of "Gigli") and Demo (Bradley Cooper of "Wedding Crashers") go rock climbing, play paintball, and swim with dolphins in lieu of any semblance of a real life.
Sue and Al understandably grow weary of having their son around, so they conjure up the only rational way to solve the problem. If you think that they just ask their 35-year-old child to move out, you're wrong. If you think that they hire a woman (Paula) to date their son, thus making him independent enough to move out, then you're right. Not only is this incredibly illogical, but it begs the question – how does that NOT make Paula a prostitute?
The premise is so ludicrous and the behavior of all the characters, particularly Paula's roommate Kit and Ace, is so puerile that I find it hard to believe that someone actually wrote them and others actually played them.
"Failure to Launch" was a chore to sit through, it was such a maddening experience. The fact that everyone around me howled with laughter at almost everything, especially when two characters perform CPR on a bird, made it that much harder.
The 411: Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker trudge through a nearly unbearable “romantic comedy” that only contains shreds of romance and even less comedy. The title is apt.
