Due Date

Plot synopsis:
High-strung architect Peter Highman (Robert Downey Jr.) is flying home to Los Angeles for the birth of his first child. Due to some Apatow-esque farcical events (which all seem to stem from child-like aspiring actor Ethan Tremblay (Zack Galifianakis), Peter ends up being shot by an air marshal and put on a no-fly list. As luck would have it, rescue comes in the form of Tremblay, who offers Peter a lift to LA, as Ethan himself is travelling to Hollywood to try his luck at becoming a "real actor".Straight away the two men's diametrically opposed personalities clash, and we discover that Ethan has a second motive for his travels: to scatter his recently deceased father's ashes. It is clear instantly that Highman has no patience for Tremblay, and this is not helped by the fact that Ethan decides to make a pitstop at the home of the nearest pot dealer, whom Tremblay "found on craigslist - she's very legitimate".The situation only deteriorates when the pair discover that they have $60 left, and to add insult to injury, Ethan spent $200 on weed. Peter decides to have money wired through to Ethan's account (his wallet, along with the rest of his luggage, were left on the plane), however when they set up the transaction, Ethan uses his stage name (Tremblay), yet only has ID showing his real surname, Chase. When the obnoxious cashier (Danny McBride), who just happens to be a "handi-capable", wheel-chair-ridden vet, decides to take matters into his own hands, and attacks Peter with what looks like a police truncheon, the situation spins out of control.When Ethan's attempts to prove himself a "real actor" by enacting scenes on request from Peter, end up exposing a more sensitive, human side to him, Peter appears to warm to Ethan. This doesn't last long, however, as Ethan's method of getting to sleep (masturbation) reminds Peter why he was so irritated by him in the first place. In the morning, as Ethan gets out of the car at a service station, Peter dumps Ethan's luggage and his pet dog Sonny out into the street before taking off in his car. To his dismay, he discovers Ethan's father's ashes in the car, and after wrestling with his conscience, decides to go back for Ethan, whom he convinces he simply went off to get them breakfast.The pair get back on the road again, but as soon as they seem to be getting back on track, Ethan, clearly sleep-deprived, falls asleep at the wheel, causing the car to career off a flyover, making it a write-off, and giving Peter a broken arm and some cracked ribs. Peter, clearly at the end of his tether, decides to ask for his friend Darryl (Jamie Foxx) to take him the rest of the way. Peter snaps at Ethan, telling him to abandon his dreams of becoming a Hollywood star, telling him he despises him, and spitting on Sonny. After some advice from Darryl, Peter decides to seek retribution for his outburst, and offers Ethan a lift too.Darryl takes the pair to his own house, where the conversation leads Ethan to accuse Darryl of having an affair with Peter's wife Sarah (Michelle Monaghan), before Darryl reveals that the "coffee" they are drinking was from the coffee pot Ethan was carrying, which actually contained his father's ashes. Ethan breaks down in tears at the implications of this, to be consoled by Peter. Ethan's accusations are forgotten momentarily, however the seed is now planted, and Peter phones his wife and leaves a message asking her if she has anything to tell him.The pair get back on the road once again, and Ethan starts smoking weed. Peter, who had fallen asleep, wakes to find that, due to Ethan having locked the windows and doors, he too is stoned, as is the dog. This leads to a dreamlike sequence wherein Ethan appears to Peter as a massive hound. Through their shared intoxication, the pair have a heart to heart and Peter apologizes for his previous "derogatory statements" toward Ethan.The pair get distracted and end up getting stuck in the queue for the border crossing into Mexico. Because Peter is clearly not an experienced cannabis smoker, his erratic behaviour causes the border official (Paul Renteria) to become suspicious of them, despite Ethan's attempts to deceive the official into thinking his glazed eyes are caused by glaucoma. The border officer orders Ethan to cut the engine and hand over the keys to the car. As the official goes to confer with his colleague, Ethan calmly takes the pot of ashes and Sonny, and walks away from the car, leaving Peter to be interrogated by the official and his colleague (Marco Rodriguez) and told, "You attempted to transport drugs across a national border. Dude, that's some serious shit."In a further twist, Ethan shows up and rescues Peter in a daring escape involving a police chase and several counts of criminal damage, nicely summed up by Peter: "How many laws did we just break?" To repay Ethan for his daring rescue, Peter drives to the Grand Canyon so that Ethan can scatter the ashes. To reflect the poignant mood, Peter decides to confess to his earlier abandonment of Ethan, and Ethan reciprocates by telling Peter that he had his wallet all along, essentially meaning that all the preceding events were unnecessary: He had kept it in order to compel Peter into accompanying him. After initially being furious at this, Peter decides to prioritise, and at long last the companions arrive at the hospital just in time to see the birth of Rosie Highman. Due to blood loss, Peter collapses, and comes round to find that Ethan cut the umbilical cord.The film ends with Peter, wife, and baby watching an episode of the Charlie Sheen comedy series "Two and a Half Men", with a guest appearance by -- guess who -- Ethan Tremblay! (the show having been Ethan's reason for becoming an actor).

Tags: revenge, comedy

Review:
But I had a lot fun with Due Date, It was a fun slapstick misadventure, almost what we loved about The Hangover, so it is clear to say I don't agree with the critics on this one.Peter(Robert Downey Jr) an architect looking to get home to his pregnant wife(Michelle Monaghan) who is expecting in a week.
And when he gets on a plane, he quickly gets kicked off, when he gets into an unfortunate incident with Ethan(Zach Galifianakis) a pot smoking moron, and wanna be actor, who is obsessed with the show Two and a Half Men. When Peter is looking for new ways to get home.
Will Peter make it on time for his child's birth, or will Ethan drive him nuts during this?A lot of people said this is a Plane,Trains and Automobiles ripoff, but you know what who cares.
I think that Due Date operates under the main premise that the viewer has never heard of Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, for if they had, they'd be wondering why they were watching the same movie with all the jokes stripped out.
Along the way, we learn much about the characters and what makes them tick, but whereas the earlier Planes, Trains got melancholy without getting maudlin, this one achieves no such feat.Downey, Jr. and Galifianakis give it their best shot, and to tell the truth they're not bad.
Furthermore, the acting by especially Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifanakis were both top notch, and I thoroughly swallowed every word they said.If you're in for a treat and hunger for laughs go watch Due Date as soon as you can!
Some plot points didn't go anywhere and others had nowhere near the possible comic payoff you were expecting.Personally I found the film lacked a certain energy, in between the large plot points there is very little funny dialogue or character development which ultimately what makes a road movie like this work.Robert Downey Jnr. plays the neurotic straight man up to 11, but often this leads to him going borderline psychotic, while Zach Galifianakis is seemingly a dozen 'wacky' characters you've seen before all rolled into one.
The John Candy role is filled by Zach Galifianakis, as Ethan, an irritant on two legs who gets Peter thrown off the plane when he won't stop saying the word "bomb".
I had great expectation that "Due Date" would be a great film, but the situations that are supposed to be funny never work and I laughed only in a couple of scenes.
Saying that, the film has its strengths and the cast delivers an above-average final product, but it does little to stand out amongst most other comedies released in the last decade.Downey Jnr. plays highly-strung expectant father Peter Highman, whose confrontation with Galifianakis' Ethan Tremblay at the airport results in both men being placed on a no-fly list.
Portraying a drug dealer supplying Ethan, who uses marijuana to 'deal with his glaucoma', her role is disappointingly minor, especially considering rumours that her character was meant to be an extension of Heidi from Old School, an earlier, and very funny, Phillips comedy.For the most part, the film operates as a road trip comedy with a simple plot, which allows it to deviate from the story frequently to deliver humorous set pieces not at all relevant to the final scene.
Did they show him a different script or did the Iron Man producers not pay him enough?I had not expected too much from Zach Galifianakis although I found him very funny in The Hangover but I now realise that they just give him a prop to play with and expect him to be funny, this time instead of a baby that he pretends to masturbate, they gave him a dog which does it itself.A very, very boring film would not recommend to anyone..
We are introduced to two men on a flight from Atlanta to Los Angeles - Peter (Robert Downey Jr.), who is an expectant father anxious to return home to witness the birth of his first child, and Ethan (Zach Galifianakis), who initially comes across as a quirky and confident wanna-be actor with the ashes of his recently deceased father in tow.However, about 15 minutes into the flick, Ethan's character inexplicably changes into a stupid, sad and reckless individual, and once problems start to arise, Peter becomes dark and mean.
Also, there is no comparison between the hysterical wake-up scene in "Planes, Trains and Automobiles" and the crude masturbation scene in Due Date which falls flat.Although Robert Downey Jr's acting is brilliant, this was supposed to be a comedy and it's hard to feel happy or amused after watching this movie..
While i have to admit that Due Date is not in my list of top ten movies of all time, but it seems that a majority of the other reviewers of this film are comparing it to Plains Trains and Automobiles.
With that said, I can agree that Phillips' seems to be getting a little complex with his story lines (this one we have seen before) and understandably after the success of The Hangover and previous comedies this will be compared to and for the common movie goer siting down to watch Due Date with those other story lines and plots in mind will be disappointed.
Robert Downy Jr. should sack his agent immediately for even suggesting a role in Due Date.An attempt at copying a classic film like Planes, Trains and Automobiles that more than failed to achieve a laugh.
Au contraire his stupid antics make me even condone Peter's tantrums and psychotic rage, mostly because I know it's more or less the same way I'd react should I ever have to be in the same room/car with Ethan...The characters do not evolve a lick, and we're not given enough (if any) background to understand why they are like they are.The credibility of the movie goes out of the window right after the pot-smoking incident and the Mexican-trailer jailbreak.
The actors are good and they appear to be trying, but with that material they are just not going to be able to create the atmosphere and the laughs of much better but similar films.Nowhere near as good as the wonderful The Hangover or even Midnight Run.Give it a miss..
For anyone around the same age as me, if you were to start describing a film where an odd couple are forced to engage in a road trip together, you'd probably think of Planes, Trains and Automobiles, the John Hughes movie from nearly twenty-five years ago.
He's not helped out by a script which requires him to be graphically unpleasant on at least a couple of occasions, and while the moments in isolation are funny they go a very long way to undermining our sympathy for his plight.Zach Galifianakis gets the John Candy role, although at times it feels as if he got a single card with the word "simpleton" on it in place of a script.
You have a road trip picture with a great comedy duo, and it's a lot of fun.Robert Downey Jr. is excellent as the high-strung Peter Highman.
2003 Due Date 2010 Death at a Funeral 2007 Dumb & Dumber 1994Thanks a lot for Robert Downey Jr., Zach Galifianakis and Todd Phillips great job,,,,,Honestly and impartially.
Awful from Start To End. This is supposed to be a comedy, I found little if nothing to make me laugh at.Robert Downey Junior looks so annoyed and bored all the time its obvious he had zero interest in it.5 minutes in I was already starting to wonder if this was the film I had read about and by 15 minutes in I was rechecking to see if I had rented the correct film and unfortunately I had.It drags on and on and stays painfully inane with the occasional minute of extreme irritation along the way.Avoid if at all possible, get a haircut, go shopping or fishing but do something better with your time, I for one wish I'd never seen this tripe..
Todd Phillips, whose The Hangover was such a hit, does another mismatched-males-on-a-trip film, reminiscent of John Hughes' 1987 film Planes, Trains And Automobiles; but he proves that good writing and skilled direction can wring juice out of a dry shell of an ideal.Put one uptight man and one weirdo together on a forced road trip and the result partly very funny, partly gross out and one small part tender —the idea of grown men realizing what it means to be really grown up.
Peter luggage and wallet are on the plane, so he is forced to share a car from Atlanta to LA with the irritating aspiring actor.The road trip is made exciting and eventful, by the bizarre things that happen on the way, and cameos by stars like Jamie Foxx, Juliette Lewis and the director himself.
Well, "Due Date" does the job, it is no Hangover but it is quite funny, entertaining and has two hilarious dudes that we all love.A classic mix up in Atlanta airport ends up getting Peter (Robert Downey Jr.) and Ethan (Zack Galifianakis) kicked out of the plane.
Even though they've just met and hit it off on the wrong foot, they both share a furious ride to LA with different motives; Peter in a hurry to make it to his child's birth and Ethan to get to Hollywood and become an actor.Galifiankis side by side with Downey Jr. is what I call good casting, and it serves the movie right.
The story, however, may seem a bit overdone at times specially on Downey's character side; it gets tense and you may even hate him for a few seconds which should not happen in such a comedy, but apart from that it's one long series of unstoppable laughing..
The movie is a rip off of Planes, Trains and Automoblies - of which I was never a great fan of Steve Martin, but I would pay to see him do a send up of the 'Last Supper' before I would watch Zach Galifianakis even recite his ABC's!!BAD BAD BAD....PS: Jamie Fox could have phoned in his performance and I bet he wish he had..
Peter (Robert Downey Jr) doesn't like Ethan (Zach Galifianakis) for a number of reasons, most notably getting him on a no-fly list.
Road trip movies have great potential for comedy, and "Due Date" could too if there were any elements of empathy in the characters.
I had read mostly mediocre review of "Due Date", so I was already going into this movie with a negative impression, but I must confess that the reviews I had read hardly paid the proper respects to this movie, because I found "Due Date" to actually be quite nice.It is a pretty straight forward comedy movie in the likes of "Planes, Trains & Automobiles" starring Steve Martin and John Candy, so if you are familiar with that classic comedy movie and liked it, then you will definitely like "Due Date" as well.The story, shortly put, is Peter Highman (played by Robert Downey, Jr.) getting into trouble because of Ethan Tremblay (played by Zach Galifianakis) outside the airport, and from there, the funny and awkward situations just escalate.I found the story to be likable and funny, and there was a lot of really great humor in the movie.
Downey and Galifianakis are really working great together, Highman being the one with his life neatly planned and everything usually in place, while Tremblay's life was chaotic and in disarray.For a comedy, then "Due Date" delivered lots of entertainment and good laughs.
Throughout the past decade Director Todd Phillips has created a name for himself by shaping the buddy comedy genre starting in 2000 with the release of "Road Trip." The films "Old School" (2003), "Starsky and Hutch" (2004), and "The Hangover" (2010) followed leading to Phillips's latest comedic creation "Due Date" created by a match made in heaven.
Phillips teams up with Zach Galifianakis ("The Hangover", "It's Kind of a Funny Story") along with Hollywood a-list super star Robert Downey Jr.
It is a buddy comedy with two actors that many would have never paired them together in a movie, however, the chemistry that Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifianakis have together on screen creates the perfect equation and drives the entire film from start until finish.
Downey and Galifianakis's relationship clicks and connects with the audiences a lot more than other buddy comedy films and incorporates a deeper vibe concerning the back-stories of both Peter and Ethan allowing their characters to avoid being one-dimensional.Michelle Monaghan does not do a very good job playing Robert Downey Jr.'s wife Sarah Highman.
Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr. are paired briefly once again in this film, the first time was in The Soloist, and Zach Galifianakis was more annoying that funny.
Due Date was always going to be compared to the Martin / Farley classic but it is in no way a rip-off / remake; they are two very different movies.Robert Downey Jr flawlessly plays the straight man who is attempting to race home to his expecting wife.
One can't help but remember Planes, Trains, and Automobiles while watching this movie, the story of an uptight architect (Downey) and a lovable loser wannabe actor (Galifanakis) forced by circumstances to make an automobile trip across country together, with the goal of making it to LA by the time Downey's character's wife gives birth on her "due date".As much as I loved PTA some twenty odd years ago, this is like the next step -- putting PTA on steroids and escalating the comedy and stunts to a new level.
i found this movie very funny there is really some good humor there specially Zack has showed one of his best performance there was good acting and a quality script if u haven't seen it yet give it try a must watchAnother thing, the acting by especially Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifanakis were both top notch, and I thoroughly swallowed every word they said.If you're in for a treat and hunger for laughs go watch Due Date as soon as you can!
I kind of wish they changed things up a little, but that's really all the negativity I got for this film.This film is about two guys, Peter and Ethan who meet at an airport the hard way and after being placed on the "No-Fly" list, they embark on a road trip cross-country from Georgia to California.This was a good idea of pairing Robert Downey Jr and Zack Galifianakis.
As it pertains to comedic partnerships, this film works pretty good with the pairing of Robert Downey Jr and Zach Galifianakis.
What brought this about was primarily Zach Galifianakis' crazy antics with his most unusual character.The plot is as follows: Peter Highman (Robert Downey, Jr), successful businessman is on his way to witness the birth of his baby across the country.
"The Hangover" was a funny film but it wasn't god's gift to comedy like almost every critic made it out to be, and the same thing goes with "Old School." Phillips knows how to make successful raunchy comedy and has done so since 2000 when he brought us "Road Trip." He's good at it but like everything else, there is room for improvement.At times, the overall story and characters in "Due Date" reminded of "Planes, Trains and Automobiles." You know, the 1987 road trip comedy with John Candy and Steve Martin that was directed by John Hughes?
I think the film tried to hard at times to be funny and I just wasn't laughing at it.I will be honest and say that I thought, Downey Jr and Galifianakis did have solid chemistry with one another.
Unfortunately, even without trying to compare it, Due Date suffers from being a disappointing movie no matter what way you look at it.While the trailers may suggest a downright hilarious comic mismatch of Downey Jr. and Galifianakis is in order for audiences, that does not seem to be the case with the final film.
Even having a partial homage-like feel to the great Planes, Trains and Automobiles is not enough to make this movie any funnier.Another point of contention is just how mean the film is.
Pairing Downey Jr. with Galifianakis was very good idea for a road trip movie plot, and Due Date holds on for all of its 100 minutes thanks to various really funny(sometimes touching) exchanges between two leads.
The cast is fantastic and all seemed very interested in this project, of course the two actors that hold the whole thing together is Robert Downey Jr and Zach Galifianakis, who make a very unlikely pairing, which is certainly the main source of fun and laughter here, we never expect to see these two in a movie together, so we're very pleased when we do, and they also proved to be able to deliver more dramatic scenes as well, the chemistry between them was stellar.
Sadly I was a little disappointed, though it was still a funny movie I somehow expected more.In Due Date Peter Highman (Robert Downy, Jr.) is attempting to travel across the country in order attend the birth of his child via cesarean section, hence the title of the film.
This is one of the funniest film I have ever watched.Zach and Robert got a very amazing work in this movie.I so laughed that sometimes I missed some of the movie.
Story is boring, nothing extravagant, has no funny scenes besides the ending, which is the first time I've actually laughed at this movie.
Galifianakis is really funny as we have praised him so many times in Hangover movies.
The road trip/buddy comedy starred Zach Galifianakis (who I was surprised to see had some good acting ability) and Robert Downey Jr.
Robert Downey Jr. was decent as always and i think this duo was very well selected for a movie like this.So, although maybe not the best comedy ever made, had some funny moments and great actors.