Paul Blart (Kevin James) is back and better than ever after 6 years of upholding and protecting the public citizens of his local mall in West Orange, NJ. His wife of 6 days leaves him and he loses his Mom (Shirley Knight) unexpectedly, then Paul receives a letter that invites him and his daughter Maya (Raini Rodriguez) out to Las Vegas for a security convention for the elite mall cops, he is pulled into action to save his kidnapped daughter from art thieves at the Wynn Hotel and resort.
Another one to scratch off my list. I’ve read in a lot of places about this being one of the worst films of 2015 so of course I had to see why for myself. I haven’t seen the first film but I always imagined it just being a series of fat jokes. This film is no different. The story here revolves around a man named Paul Blart (James) whose been having a tough run as of late. His wife left him after 6 days and then lost his mom (Knight) in an unfortunate accident. When he and his daughter Maya (Rodriguez) get invited to a convention in Las Vegas, he is pulled into the middle of an art heist at the hotel where they are staying. I read that this movie is intended to be a comedy but the problem with that was that I just didn’t find it funny. I found this movie to be chock-full of stupid and not the good kind. From Blart himself to his security guard friends, this is just a display of silliness bordering on stupid which just didn’t work out. You could definitely see James’ dedication to the role, committing to all the silliness but he just wasn’t funny. To me, this film was just cheesy gags, unfunny dialogue, and stupid slapstick which missed far more than it hit. The film just seemed lazy here being a series of fat jokes and the story wasn’t overly original and derivative of the first film (or so I’m told). I just found all of this to be very painful to watch as I spent most of the time (luckily it’s not a very long film) waiting for something funny to happen and I will admit to seeing something but it didn’t come until near the end (I believe it’s in one of the trailers but I still won’t spoil it). But that’s still not saying much because of the obvious use of CGI.The film also featured a series of romantic subplots between Blart’s daughter Maya (Rodriguez) and Blart himself. Maya has a relationship with a bellhop, Lane (David Henrie), which never went anywhere (I suppose this was just to give her something to do). Blart was involved with a hotel manager which just seemed forced and a little unbelievable. The family parts with Paul and Maya didn’t work for me either as I never saw them as a family. Paul is a terrible father, constantly imposing himself on his daughter. This is indicative in a subplot involving Paul moving on with his life while relinquishing control of Maya as he has a problem being alone. This was hinted at but never really went anywhere. There is supposed to be a villain (Neal McDonough) in here but we never got to have a connection as we never got to know anything about him. The film was just character walking in and out inexplicably so I never cared about any of them as we never got to know anything about them. Overall, this is just an unfunny mess of a film which will unfortunately get attention from kids who do not know better as they will inevitably laugh at all of its stupidity. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Kevin James film that I liked.
Score: 4/10
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The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.