Directed and Written by : Jon Lucas, Scott Moore
Starring : Mila Kunis, Kathryn Hahn, Kristen Bell, Christina Applegate
Release Date : July 28, 2016
Mere minutes into "Bad Moms" I was reminded that I clearly was not the target audience for this movie. A lot of the jokes are blatantly designed to entertain women and Moms more than men and Fathers, although there are some moments that are funny in non-gender specific ways. Personally there were very few comedic scenes that I actually found laugh-out-loud funny, with more of them being in the just-amusing category. A scene in particular involving a demonstration about uncircumcised penises is just an example of one of the jokes that I genuinely found hilarious.
The conceit of this movie is to remind us that Moms can't always be perfect, are just human, and that it's unrealistic to think they should do everything for their kids. That thematic lesson for this film is undeniably admirable and welcome. However, this movie is much too on the nose about it, beats you over the head with it, and rubs it in your face, in just about every single scene. Add in many examples of how men are undependable, ineffective, heartless, cheaters, and we've got ourselves a movie that can be very obnoxious to watch at times. Yes it's very biased towards women empowerment, and it's unfortunate that it doesn't do it in truly imaginative ways.
Luckily the female cast here is good. Mila Kunis can be a sympathetic enough character, Kristen Bell is enjoyable to watch as the naive and repressed Mom, Christina Applegate plays the mean girl role very well, and Kathryn Hahn goes all out being the over-the-top bad Mom. That is what people are going to watch this movie for right? Moms behaving badly. There are moments where the Moms do go full on nuts with how outrageous they are being, with montage sequences filled with very liberal use of slow-mo; which can get quite annoying to put up with. Unfortunately this movie still plays things relatively safe in that regards, and the plot progresses in a very obvious and expected way.
Despite the criticisms I have for "Bad Moms," I couldn't find myself completely hating it solely because of it's good intentions in giving women and Moms a wish-fulfillment type of movie. I'm still not the intended audience for it though, and I wish it could have just been more clever in how to relay it's thematic message.
loveditenjoyedititsokay IT'S MEH itsterrible
