Starring Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Elizabeth Banks, Brooklyn Decker, Anna Kendrick, Chris Rock, Dennis Quaid, Genesis Rodriguez, Megan Mullally, Wendi McLendon-Covey ("Bridesmaids"), Rodrigo Santoro, Chace Crawford, Rob Huebel ("Human Giant"), Thomas Lennon ("A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas"), Joe Manganiello, and more, the new pregnancy comedy, "What To Expect When You're Expecting" often looks like the catch-all, all-things-to-everyone style comedy. And/or a bit like the holiday comedies of late, "New Year's Eve" and "Valentine's Day," which use the formula of dozens of celebrity actors big and small, shake and stir and hope that it all makes sense in the end. The marketing for the films has thus far insulted intelligence — look at these awesome/awful posters — however, it's also geared at triggering that "I can relate with that! ha!" response.
Directed by Kirk Jones ("Nanny McPhee," "Waking Ned Devine," "Everbody's Fine") while "What To Expect What You're Expecting" looks a little awful to many of us, it's arguable that the audiences who love things like "Everyone Loves Raymond," "Mike & Molly," "The King Of Queens," etc., could respond really positively to this film. Whether those audiences turn up in theaters or not is debatable, but this latest trailer aims at the guys with its "no judging" theme. It's ok to be a bad parent because we're all just learning! Due in theaters May 18, this writer will admit he laughed a little bit at the first trailer — in the same way that some of us like bad Adam Sandler movies — but this dudes-centric trailer is pretty flat and doesn't feel terrifically appealing. Perhaps you feel otherwise.
Looks fun enough, hopefully all the good part aren't in the trailer, but I really like all the comedians they picked for the film.
On one hand, as a very participatory father of two who is rather annoyed at how media and society basically ignores the dad in terms of raising kids (I'd like to help change that diaper, but sorry, no changing table in the men's bathroom!), it's heartening to see a film that actually shows fathers taking a proactive role in the whole parenting thing. On the other hand, it also plays on the 'dads are incompetent boobs who do horrible things to their kids' meme, which doesn't help the situation much either.