keep the laffs comin' guys

Rating: 7/10 (16 April 2008)

The post-credits store sequence openly dares you to hate this movie's mannered, artifice-riven dialogue, but soon enough the disarmingly low-key performers are making me love it. And hell, so is the dialogue itself - if the Marx Brothers can do it, why can't Diablo Cody? And as long as you're being witty, who cares how your movie reads as allegory? Unfortunately, that 'as long' comes to a jarring halt when the adopting parents' marital issues go public, in the process defanging this charmer the way Louis B. Mayer neutered Harpo. You could imagine an insightful movie about aging counterculture types clinging to their youthful rebellion as a matter of stunted emotional growth instead of principle, but why get all serious about it? That's what sitcoms do. Why not make your points through the comedy that we came for?? Movies that put this much stock in the intelligence of kids should not resort to finger-wagging - and those saintly salt-of-the-earth parents deserve at least one serious character flaw each (being working class is NOT a character flaw).