Better in the small moments

Rating: Null/10 (9 June 2014)

Meet the Parents' tries to be equal parts subtle human comedy and slapstick comedy. The first works, the second gets in the way.
The movie stars Ben Stiller as a likable guy in love with his girlfriend Pam (Teri Polo) but is thwarted in almost every attempt to ask her hand in marriage (his latest proposal is interrupted when she gets a call on her cell phone). They've been dating long enough that Pam thinks that it's time for him to meet her parents in Long Island.
Pam's father Jack is a nightmare of smiling intimidation from the moment he meets Greg and Greg tries mercilessly to manuver his way from one social blunder to the next. Robert De Niro has fun as the father who manages to catch Greg in little white lies in such a way that he has to tell bigger ones to get out of it. One social blunder falls into another especially when Greg tries to make small talk about 'Puff the Magic Dragon's supposed drug theme which leads Jack to think he's a pothead. I especially liked the way that Greg tries to reason out why he was looking at a breast pump ad, which leads to an explanation about cat milking.
I wish that the movie would have stayed at this level with the way in which Stiller gets himself in deeper and deeper and the way that De Niro has of stepping on every sentence like a cat playing with a mouse. The problem is that while the dialogue works, the screenplay allows for a whole series of overblown slapstick scenes that don't.
I can deal with the sweet verbal intimidation on De Niro's part but when Stiller sets the gutter on fire, floods the backyard with sewage, gets arrested for being a terrorist and accidentally breaks Pam's sister's nose I cover my eyes in embarrassment. For every scene that I liked, there was a scene that I didn't like.
I liked the running gag about Greg's last name Focker which plays into some of the film's best lines, especially when we find out Pam's middle name. But I found it painful when De Niro reads a tearful poem about his late mother which is followed by Stiller accidentally breaking her urn.
There is a wonderful scene at the end in which the two men, sitting at a table, finally just work everything out. But it's followed by a scene in which De Niro watches Stiller lash out on his home Nanny Cam. This scene is funny but why is it at the end of the movie? It seems to come too late.
De Niro is an actor who can turn the most mainstream role into a brilliant performance. Here he plays a guy who loves his family but is overprotective of his daughter especially from a guy who stumbles as much as Stiller's character does.
The movie was directed by Jay Roach to directed the 'Austin Powers' films and like the sequel, 'Meet the Parents' is better in it's smaller moments.