Diane Keaton ("The Godfather," "Annie Hall") and Jon Heder ("Napoleon Dynamite," "Blades of Glory") have made some good movies over the years. This is not one of them.
"Mama's Boy" (2007), written by Hank Nelken ("Saving Silverman," "Are We Done Yet?") and directed by Tim Hamilton ("Shrink," "Truth in Advertising"), is allegedly a comedy, but I cannot for the life of me figure out where the filmmakers intended the humor to come. Maybe I should have seen it in a theater and picked up my clues to laugh from the rest of the audience. Unfortunately, Warner Bros. released the film in a limited run, and it never got to my community. Not that I probably would have paid money to see it, in any case.
As you might infer from the title, the movie is about a mother-son relationship. Keaton plays a widowed mom, Jan Mannus, and Heder plays her son, Jeffrey. Jan is an attractive, middle-aged lady who hasn't dated since her husband died in an automobile accident many years earlier. Her big chance for happiness comes in the person of Merton J. Rosenbloom, a motivational speaker (or "success coach," as he likes people to call him), whom she begins to date.
Jeffrey is a twenty-nine-year-old slacker who's still living at home. He's a klutzy, nerdy, selfish, immature, hypochondriacal, overly protected, and overly protective man-child who refuses to share his mother with anybody. He's worked as a clerk in the same bookstore for thirteen years and tells people he's living at home "until he makes his first astronomical discovery." We see a telescope in his bedroom, but we never see him use it. He pursues fantasy games and hangs out at video arcades while "I Don't Want to Grow Up" plays in the background. So much for subtlety.
The movie is about Jeffrey's crusade to ensure that Mert doesn't get to first base with his mom. Mert, who is almost terrifyingly upbeat most of the time, initially does his best to befriend Jeffrey, but it doesn't work. They war with one another in various childish ways for most of the movie's ninety-three-minute running time in the apparent hope that either one of them will win or the audience will give up and go home.
The movie's biggest problem is that it concentrates on Jeffrey, and Jeffrey is a jerk. When Mert moves in with Jeffrey's mom, Jeffrey goes nuts. He loves his mother so much, he is willing to ruin her life for his own self-centered ends. I wonder why the filmmakers thought such a character would be funny? Or even the subject of comedy? There are no redeeming qualities to his personality. He meets a really sweet girl, Nora Flannigan (Anna Faris), who works in a coffee house across from his bookstore, and she sort of falls for him. But he rebuffs her advances at every turn. Why an attractive, smart, imaginative person like Nora would see anything in a loser like Jeffrey is anybody's guess.
The only person in the movie who brings any joy to a scene is ninety-odd-year-old Eli Wallach, who plays Jeffrey's boss. His crotchety old-timer at least has some life in him.
Diane Keaton ("The Godfather," "Annie Hall") and Jon Heder ("Napoleon Dynamite," "Blades of Glory") have made some good movies over the years. This is not one of them.
"Mama's Boy" (2007), written by Hank Nelken ("Saving Silverman," "Are We Done Yet?") and directed by Tim Hamilton ("Shrink," "Truth in Advertising"), is allegedly a comedy, but I cannot for the life of me figure out where the filmmakers intended the humor to come. Maybe I should have seen it in a theater and picked up my clues to laugh from the rest of the audience. Unfortunately, Warner Bros. released the film in a limited run, and it never got to my community. Not that I probably would have paid money to see it, in any case.
As you might infer from the title, the movie is about a mother-son relationship. Keaton plays a widowed mom, Jan Mannus, and Heder plays her son, Jeffrey. Jan is an attractive, middle-aged lady who hasn't dated since her husband died in an automobile accident many years earlier. Her big chance for happiness comes in the person of Merton J. Rosenbloom, a motivational speaker (or "success coach," as he likes people to call him), whom she begins to date.
Jeffrey is a twenty-nine-year-old slacker who's still living at home. He's a klutzy, nerdy, selfish, immature, hypochondriacal, overly protected, and overly protective man-child who refuses to share his mother with anybody. He's worked as a clerk in the same bookstore for thirteen years and tells people he's living at home "until he makes his first astronomical discovery." We see a telescope in his bedroom, but we never see him use it. He pursues fantasy games and hangs out at video arcades while "I Don't Want to Grow Up" plays in the background. So much for subtlety.
The movie is about Jeffrey's crusade to ensure that Mert doesn't get to first base with his mom. Mert, who is almost terrifyingly upbeat most of the time, initially does his best to befriend Jeffrey, but it doesn't work. They war with one another in various childish ways for most of the movie's ninety-three-minute running time in the apparent hope that either one of them will win or the audience will give up and go home.
The movie's biggest problem is that it concentrates on Jeffrey, and Jeffrey is a jerk. When Mert moves in with Jeffrey's mom, Jeffrey goes nuts. He loves his mother so much, he is willing to ruin her life for his own self-centered ends. I wonder why the filmmakers thought such a character would be funny? Or even the subject of comedy? There are no redeeming qualities to his personality. He meets a really sweet girl, Nora Flannigan (Anna Faris), who works in a coffee house across from his bookstore, and she sort of falls for him. But he rebuffs her advances at every turn. Why an attractive, smart, imaginative person like Nora would see anything in a loser like Jeffrey is anybody's guess.
The only person in the movie who brings any joy to a scene is ninety-odd-year-old Eli Wallach, who plays Jeffrey's boss. His crotchety old-timer at least has some life in him.
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