Plain-spoken, matter-of-fact fantasy...gleefully, if at times obnoxiously, 'incorrect'

Rating: 6/10 (14 July 2012)

After receiving a large stuffed teddy bear for Christmas in 1985, a friendless boy from Boston makes a bedtime wish that his plush toy will come to life and be his best friend forever...of course, the next morning, the teddy bear is walking, talking, and scaring the crap out of the kid's parents. 27 years later, the world-renown, celebrated talking teddy bear is still buddies with the boy, now a 35-year old man with a dead-end job who dodges responsibilities and constantly puts his girlfriend second. Extremely well-produced, well-executed comedy that gives us a talking toy who is readily accepted by society--he even gets a cashiering job at the neighborhood supermarket!--yet never loses sight of the human characters at the heart of the story. Producer-director Seth MacFarlane, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Alec Sulkin and Wellesley Wild (based on MacFarlane's original treatment), goes for broke with the raunchy gags and movie in-jokes, though the stop-and-start romance between Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis appears to mean just as much to MacFarlane as does the scatological humor. Some of the jokes fall flat, as does an overlong fight scene, an even longer wild party sequence, and an apparent need to be as comically offensive as possible. When the movie is sweetly-rendered, like R-rated whimsy, it's not only devilishly funny but also surprisingly affable. **1/2 from ****