Due Date Review

Before I post this critique I want to mention that I love Todd Phillips. Anyone who can cause me to love a movie about Starsky and Hutch is a comedic genius. When you inspect his ouevre you realize that he is the Martin Scorsese of comedy. I, like any comedically-minded person, would kill (not literally...... well...) to be in one of his movies. When I was at The Comedy Store in Hollywood a couple of weeks ago one of the comics misinterpreted something that an audience member said, literally hopped a foot or so into the air and said, "Todd Phillips IS HERE?!" No.. but one of the actors who played a main character in "Slumdog Millionaire" and a high-ranking Disney executive was, so it wasn't an absurd question by any stretch. Anyway, such is the respect that Phillips commands.

Now... onto the review...

When one thinks about buddy comedies he generally considers similar characters: "Grumpy Old Men;" "Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion;" "Beavis and Butthead;" "Dumb and Dumber," etc.
In Due Date the characters are polar opposites. You might say, "well, it's not unheard of-- a 'straight man' and a wisecracking asshole." Well, not exactly. In this movie Zach Galifinakis reprises his role as the "special" guy. Robert Downey, Jr. (much to my horror) plays the stereotypical Los Angeles asshole. The problem with this combo-- and I'm certain that Phillips has already realized this-- is that we start to relate to Downey's character at the beginning. It's like a bear trap because he slips into an elitist and almost psychopathic character as the film progresses. Somewhere near the midpoint he begins to regard his mentally impaired sidekick with almost murderous rage. Mentally, we begin to wander away from the movie.
It has a few good jokes, but the flow is all wrong.
In "The Hangover" one could relate to either Ed Helms' and/or Bradley Cooper's character fairly easily. Galifinakis was the funny freak.

It's not to say that Due Date doesn't have charm and humor. However, I would rank it 2 of 5 stars.