Directed By Gail Lerner

Starring – Zach Braff, Gabrielle Union, Erika Christensen

The Plot – The story of the raucous exploits of a blended family of 12, the Bakers, as they navigate a hectic home life while simultaneously managing their family business.

Rated PG for thematic elements, suggestive material, and adult language

Cheaper by the Dozen | Official Trailer | Disney+ – YouTube

POSITIVES

As is typical with other films under the Cheaper By the Dozen banner, the dramatic heft is the more compelling and nourishing center to this entire story, this time bringing with it an abundance of racially-fueled situations involving environmental perception that prescribes justification for the contemporary installment. Though this is a Disney film, first and foremost, which means most of these will be approached from a squeaky-clean emphasis, the diversity in approach does at least stitch with it an organic conflict within the family that isn’t just twelve people living together under a madhouse, solidifying with it an endearing narrative that does bring reasoning for this family to stick together, all the while depicting honest social commentary of the most beneficial circumstance. Aside from this, the performances, while limited to types, do at least exude a bountiful amount of fun and personality to the designs of their characters. Braff is definitely the show-stealer here, committing to such flat humor and intention-heavy dialogue that does him no favors on the whole of humanity, but does cement a professionalism for him that proves he isn’t sleeping through the role. Union is also a warm breath of fresh air, and the chemistry she shares with Braff exudes an underlining chemistry in dynamic that serves as the quintessential heart of this family, igniting the flame of romantic bond between them that has continuously sufficed even after ten kids.

NEGATIVES

With the minimal amount of pleasantries out of the way, the 2022 iteration of “Cheaper By the Dozen” is a colossal misfire. This begins first and foremost with the cheap obviousness in production value, which not only defines the movie’s presentation with a sitcom level of artistic style, but also leaves these interactions of dialogue feeling artificially hollow between them. The side-sliding transitions between scenes and sequences breed an air of familiarity to ABC television oculars that fall flat on substantial style, and when combined with the cheapest cinematography of basic, riskless symmetry, crafts a presentation that is difficult to take seriously and invest in. As for the aforementioned humor, it’s completely abysmal, influenced by hip lingo and dated references of the most pandering variety. To say I didn’t laugh once in the entire 97-minute feature would be dramatically understating its complete lack of value, so instead I’ll say that this is embarrassing levels of creative writing that are consistently cringe over cute and lulled by the desperation in direction reaching for a woke enveloping. I’m the first guy to support progression among cultures and the creative arts, but when it comes at a price of political obviousness to its inclusion, I’d rather it not even attempt such a monumental feat. Whether in the opening frame of the movie focusing on posters saying “Black Lives Matter” or “Erase hate”, or even the names of family’s two dogs being Bark Obama and Joe Biten, it all summarizes the corny pandering that this film undertakes, made worse by the predictability of the material that ever keeps you from being even momentarily surprised by its various failed punchlines. Then there’s the characterization of the kid characters, which are not only one-dimensional types of the least stimulating variety (One child’s gimmick is continuously running into a door), but also these hollow seat fillers that are made all the more alienating with some of the worst child acting that I have seen in quite sometime. Some kids are directly looking off screen to the producers or cue cards, others don’t properly convey the tonal context of a scene they accompany, and it all points to a flat series of extras who outnumber positive returns in cast to the point that you will inevitably be subjected to them periodically at some point in the perils of the script. They’re mere props for the adult characters to use at their disposal, before being placed back into the drawer of oblivion that we never hear nor feel influence from when their characters aren’t involved in the dynamic existing in front of the camera. Beyond this, the script itself is a mess in both dialogue and story tiers that fight for time in such a minimal amount of run time allowance. This leads to arcs between each of the kids, but never as anything that doesn’t feel like temporary filler on the way to a bigger picture not involving them. Conflicts materialize and resolve themselves in a matter of minutes with the most predictable instances, and no single character is ever transformed or made better because of the clarity received from such an occasion. Even the central plot involving the family moving to a gated community inside of the same city feels problematic because the kids are whisked away from their schools and friends for no reason what so ever. This certainly creates a problem of believability that these parents have for the love of their kids in sacrificing their interests for such arbitrary reasons. One such example is their oldest daughter who is a basketball player and competing for a scholarship to USC, yet they remove her from all of that for reasons that simply don’t add up to the realism of the reality, to which this film never subscribes to. It’s a plaguing ingenuity that audiences can easily interpret, which in turn sacrifices the heart in the narrative that have driven four previous films of the same franchise before this one, leaving it incapable of even attaining the most basic of functions for audience familiarity.

OVERALL

Disney Plus have had a rough year when it comes to remaking popular franchises, and “Cheaper By the Dozen” might just be their worst to date. Plagued by an abundance of TV-level production value, one-dimensional characters, and a complete void of comedic levity at the hands of woke-heavy idealism, this clunky contemporary simply can’t locate a heart to its conveyor-belt narrative that is absolved of any personality or compelling focal point.

My Grade: 2/10 or F