Film Reviews

Cheaper By The Dozen 2

• Rating:
• Director: Adam Shankman.
• Starring: Steve Martin, Bonnie Hunt, Eugene Levy, Hillary Duff.
• Details: US, 87mins, PG.

A follow-up to last year's Cheaper by the Dozen, this sees Martin and Hunt reprise their roles as Tom and Kate Baker, parents to an unfeasibly large family. While on vacation with their rascals in tow, they encounter Eugene Levy's brood of eight and a competition of sorts strikes up between them. Cue mayhem and slapstick humour as keeping up with the Jones's takes on a whole new meaning. Cheaper by the Dozen seems to be Hollywood's mantra right now: release a poor remake of a pointless film and, before anyone can truly fathom how bad it is, hit them with a sequel. It's getting harder and harder to remember but Steve Martin was once a funny man who starred in classics like The Man With Two Brains and Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid. He halted the downward trajectory of his career with Bowfinger, but it's tough to feel any sympathy when he appears in movies like this. Martin has played the put-upon parent before, but where Parenthood had a message at its core, Cheaper by the Dozen's message seems to be 'don't have twelve kids – it's really hard'. Like, no kidding, Sherlock. There are some highlights in Ashton Kutcher's narcissistic model-actor cameo but we've seen all this before. Imagine Home Alone multiplied by twelve; that's right - a nightmare for anyone over the age of 12.

Review by Gavin Burke