House Broken

Now I have to admit that this is a lousy movie with a lousy concept. I am typing as I watch this. The awful thing is I am finding it reasonably funny. Now not Blazing Saddles funny but amusing in a really dumb sort of way. Danny De Vito has made so much better films than this and he is the best thing in it, even though he does not appear much. The guys who play the sons in this(I cannot even be bothered to find out who they are) do an OK job but only OK not great. The guys who play their friends cannot seriously be contemplating a film career based on this outing. The writing is poor and the direction is so-so. As I state in my summary it is a guilty pleasure watching this and I feel like it is sucking the intelligence out of me. But I cannot stop watching it. Sue me or Kill me now!!

Tom is retiring after 25 years at the fire department in a California town. He is looking forward to spending time with Mary, but his two lazy sons Quinn and Elliot are still living with him and he wants them out. Mary refuses to make them go because she so enjoys providing for their every need. And it's not that the boys are lazy. Quinn is a filmmaker who knows how to use computers to add lots of fancy features and edit. Elliot, who seems dumb, is actually the creative mind for his bother's business. So far, though, they only post on YouTube and they haven't made a dime. They worked at a car dealer once but hated it because of their need to be creative.

Tom buys an RV and kidnaps Mary, taking her to a remote cabin and locking her up. When she tries to escape, the situation upsets their neighbors who think Tom is abusing Mary.

The boys discover the hard way that they are on their own. What they don't know is that Tom has had video cameras set up so he can monitor what the boys are doing, and the frustrated Mary takes some comfort in being able to see her boys.

It takes them a while, but they eventually learn what it takes to cope on their own. Their loser friends including Shirtless Boy need a place to stay, and Sarah, the mail carrier who got fired for trying to be creative (and got fired from the grocery store for trying to be creative) also needs a room. And Elliot likes her. She's pretty in a nerdy way and wants to be a masseuse. Quinn likes Suzy next door, daughter of Tom's widowed and tough co-worker, who is gorgeous and an airhead, wants to be a cheerleader but can't quite master the moves.

The boys have room for one more renter. Several hilarious potential renters show up in response to an ad the boys don't remember placing. The first several wouldn't work at all, but Hector is perfect. Or so they think. And soon the boys learn just what responsibility means.

So will the boys really learn to cope on their own? Danny DeVito and Katey Sagal give their usual performances. I'm sure no one will mistake this for a quality production despite the presence of these two talented actors, but they do add something.

Regardless of what you might think of everything else, Matthew Glave is very good as the perfect--okay, not so-perfect--tenant.

I don't know anything about Caitlin Crosby, but she's adorable. She seems intelligent but it might be the glasses.

Even if this isn't a great movie, it is very funny, provided you like the loser party animal fratboy image and demented physical comedy. I wouldn't recommend it for family viewing because even cleaned up, it has some quite filthy humor. But it's good for some silly laughs.

Be sure to stay around for the outtakes. It appears everyone had fun making this movie. Some of the outtakes don't even appear to be bloopers because they were used, such as the woman at the power company dancing.

If you like movies about losers, this may be for you.

I had zero expectation when I started watching this movie about two slacker brothers who won't leave their parents' house. Oddly enough, it was as good as any other juvenile type comedy, and probably even better in some respects. For one, it's not just slapstick stupidity that tends to characterize Will Ferrell's movies, for example. There is a lot of underhanded humour that the two leads pull off very well throughout the course of the film.

I believe that comedy is the hardest genre because it's really hard to genuinely be funny and make people laugh. While I wasn't on the floor, it WAS funny and it entertained. I recommend it you're bored and looking for a few laughs.

In this very offensive and unsuitable for viewing film, Danny Devito and Katey Segal are the parents of two lazy-bottom young men. Devito retires from the Fire Dept after 25 years and, at that point, realizes how shiftless his kids are. Wife has been taking care of the them for years. So, Devito kidnaps his wife and takes the camper out of town, to stay until the young adult sons learn how to take care of themselves. Admittedly, there are a few laughs at the beginning. When the fire truck escorts newly retired Devito home, an energetic cheerleader-gymnast does handsprings right into the fire truck! In that same scene, the VERY challenged sons manage to turn the main water spout on full blast, shoving a young girl on a tricycle against a wall. But, not long after that, very offensive language and scenes start to add up and this viewer had to turn it off and pitch it into a waste basket. What a shame, since the premise was clever and Devito is always a funny, funny man. When a film advertised for general viewing should have been given an NC-17 rating, that's a big problem.

After you've watched this movie, you can call it both ways, especially after Danny Devito's 2 sons, Ryan Hansen as Elliot, and Skyler Stone as Quinn, are done. Talk about what have to be the most nerdy, brainless, half-witted, clueless and screw-balled airheads - these 2 and their pack of equally dumb friends. Their girlfriends weren't much better either.

It was a pleasure, though, to see Danny DeVito once again. After all these years, he proves that he hasn't lost his touch, ever so excellent. That expression he has when arching his brow and puckering his lips, signaling he's about to drum up something, cracks me up still just as it did way back when he made Twins with Arnold Schwarzenegger. In this movie, boy does he have a handful with his dysfunctional misfits, an airhead of a wife not willing to live without "her boys", a wacky neighbor in the persona of Tom Wilson (yes, the very same "Biff" from Back to the Future), and a firefighter friend he hires with a pet snake to scare off the Brady bunch (John Farley as "Nate").

But our hero, now ex-Fire Chief and Firefighter Captain, has no intention of spending his retirement accompanied by screwballs, be they his sons or not. Oh no! he has a whole plan drawn up to teach these guys to be men, and move on. Does he succeed? Well, you'll have to find out.

What I take exception to is the constant and varied sexual innuendos, not played down either - but really crass and crude. There were several moments where public references to both male and female genitalia were made; I do not see what this had to do with the plot, or how it contributed to the story, other than cheapening it unnecessarily. Lots of dildos illustrating their function - at one time, the elder plays at putting one in his brother's mouth while sleeping. There was a scene with a dummy which I thought sick and unnecessary, and the list goes on.

This, primarily, is what prompted my low score. It isn't a flick you'll want to watch with your family, especially not young kids. So if you watch this, make sure whomever is with you (if anyone) is mature enough and will not take undue offense at such portrayal of what nowadays is called 'humor'.

That being said, a few laughs and giggles are on the menu, tainted, sadly, with a lot of mindless humor and crude language/behavior.