Movie Review: Big Mommas: Like Father Like Son (2011)

Big Mommas: Like Father Like Son (2011)

Directed By:
John Whitesell

Starring:
Martin Lawrence: Big Momma
Brandon T. Jackson: Trent Pierce
Faizon Love: Kurtis Kool

Rating:

The Goddamn Plane Has Crashed Into the Mountain

You know that part of Raiders of the Lost Ark where the Nazis have Indiana Jones and Marion tied up and are going to force them to watch as the contents of the Ark of the Covenant are unveiled, presumably resulting in the Nazis winning World War II? How Indy was all like “Don’t look!” and he and Marianne didn’t look while the Nazis did and had their faces promptly melted off by the awesome power of God? Big Mommas: Like Father Like Son is a lot like that scene, only it goes on considerably longer and is likely to convince you that God is either dead or a Hollywood executive who only greenlights the worst film sequels possible.

Officially the worst movie featuring Martin Lawrence in a fat suit, Big Mommas is a movie about a father/son undercover operation at an all-girls school, so you can probably guess that the son is girl crazy and the father wishes he’d keep his libido under the dress. But there wouldn’t be any comedy if Trent (Brandon T. Jackson) were able to keep it under his plus-sized dress. Early on, the movie establishes that Trent got into Duke University, but he’s an aspiring rapper with a mixtape, and school kids don’t get paid like rappers. Judging from the two songs he performs as Prodi-G and how smart he is in a gunfight/hostage situation/stock sitcom plot, he’s not long for either career, but you can guess which one he chooses.

So, without any dramatic or comedic tension, Martin Lawrence and Brandon T. Jackson plod their way through 90 minutes of awkward dialog, old fat jokes, and worse ones about crossdressing. Along the way, Faizon Love appears as a chubby-chasing security guard, but, oh-ho, he’s unaware that he’s actually chasing a different kind of chubby. The movie really needed Love, if only because it would have been wholly unrealistic for Lawrence and Jackson to apprehend even the biggest bumbler in criminal history. The big mommas are stupid, stupid people, and it’s hard to imagine anybody laughing at their cliché, stereotypical antics.

If God is a cynical Hollywood exec, He’s been rather busy lately. In the past four or five years, we’ve been given unnecessary sequels to Cats and Dogs, Baby Geniuses, The Mask, and now Big Momma’s House. None of these films have made money, and I can’t imagine they were greenlit for any other reason than to claim the losses as a rather massive tax write-off, with whatever money the film makes from DVD or syndication rights as gravy. Here’s the thing, though: The movie was going to lose money, and they made it anyhow. As 3D and sequels like this continue to lose traction and serious filmgoers retreat to the arthouses and, increasingly, their Netflix queues, I’ve got to wonder why you wouldn’t leave a movie like Big Mommas in development hell and greenlight two or three movies like Meek’s Cutoff. Admittedly, those films aren’t going to rake in the cash, but they'll at least have the distinction of being worth the time and effort that goes into production. Hell, you could even take the money you’d save by making those other films and give it to Martin Lawrence to not make movies like Big Mommas. Just a suggestion, God.