FanUnity B(uzz)log

Most sequels pale in comparison to their predecessors. A select very few are actually better movies. “Meet The Fockers” is in the first group.”Meet The Fockers” came out on DVD last week, and since I greatly enjoyed “Meet The Parents”, I decided to check out the sequel. Ben Stiller’s characters typically do a good job of cracking me up. Some of my favorite zany Stiller roles were in “Zoolander”, “Dodgeball”, “Starsky & Hutch” and “Happy Gilmore.” Robert DeNiro was also funny as heck in “Meet The Parents”, so I was interested in seeing his character up to more paranoid and off-putting hijinks.

The gags and exchanges in the film weren’t as funny this time around. While I enjoyed the intensity that DeNiro’s character Jack Byrnes brought to training his baby grandson to be a genius, I didn’t find any of the gags to do with the baby that funny. The cursing and drinking gag was all very predictable.

New cast additions Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Striesand don’t bring a whole lot to the table as Gaylord Focker’s uncomfortabley open-minded parents. They are all right, but nothing special. They do set one of the funniest recurring lines of humor into motion, however, when they reveal at dinner with the Byrnes how they caught Gaylord pleasuring himself to the passport photo of their maid, Isabel. They then go on to reveal that Gaylord lost his virginity to Isabel 19 years ago, setting up the hilarious revealing of Isabel’s Ben Stiller-lookalike 19 year old son Jorge. Ray Santiago, who plays Jorge, is hilarious and nails Stiller’s Gaylord Focker mannerisms perfectly.

The thing I least enjoyed about “Meet The Fockers” was the fact that at the end Jack Byrnes is changed by the softie parent Fockers. One of the things I liked about “Meet The Parents” was that Jack didn’t soften up too much by the end of the film as was still his hilariously hardassed self. This film basically ruins that.

As far as comedies go, it isn’t bad, but it is nowhere near as good as the first one.

2.5/5 Stars.