Movie Review: Date Night - I Wanted This To Be Funny

Movie : Date Night
Starring: Steve Carell, Tina Fey, Mark Walhberg
Director: Shaun Levy

I like Steve Carell and I like Tina Fey they are both pretty funny on their perspective TV shows The Office and 30 Rock. So putting them together in a movie sounds like a pretty good move on paper. It doesn't turn out that way though. In this movie Carell and Fey play a married couple named the Fosters. They are your standard boring couple. They both work and they also have a child. This leaves them with little time for romance or excitement. Because of this they reserve one night a week to get a babysitter and go out. Even their date nights though have become dull and uninteresting. Determined not to become a boring old couple they head to city for a night they won't forget. When they take someone else's reservation though they get mistaken for entirely different couple. One that is involved in blackmail and someone is trying to kill.



The premise is not terribly bad. Put some average characters into situations they would normally never be in and see what happens. The problem with this movie is that it does not go far enough. It never lets these two comedians really go all out with these characters. It plays it safe and sticks to the script which for the most part is boring. The few funny parts are the ones where they actors are improvising. Otherwise the movie is just not that funny. The movie is helped by the fact that the Carell and Fey at least make the characters likable. However, this is a comedy and so it must be judged on how funny it was and it doesn't measure up. Another problem is that these two are supposed to be married but they have absolutely no romantic chemistry whatsoever. The serious scenes then feel flat and pointless because you don't really believe these two would ever be married.

Overall I would skip this movie even if you're a big fan of the actors you would be better off watching and old episode of their TV shows. The laughs just aren't there.
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