One of the problems with family movies these days is that there’s too many that have nothing to offer. Andy Fickman’s Playing With Fire is exactly that – it’s ludicrously lazy with nothing to offer aside from cute kids and wasted talent. It’s a “family” movie in the same way that things like Paul Blart: Mall Cop and Daddy’s Home are – it’s a combination of common tropes found in family movies with absolutely zero of the authenticity and reliability of families that made a few hits in the genre stand out. For a good amount of its runtime, the film throws in a bunch of adult jokes that go over all the kids’ heads but make all the adults cringe – and that just adds to the film’s uninspired nature. Movies are able to overcome familiar frameworks, that of the “family” movie with adult jokes, if they offer up anything interesting like good acting or satisfying messages. Unfortunately, Playing With Fire doesn’t.
The script is poor due to its straightforward narrative and surface-level exploration of deep family themes. Almost no one has a good performance here, but Keegan-Michael Key and John Leguizamo stick out like sore thumbs because of how obnoxious they are when they turn their signature schticks up to 11 throughout the film. John Cena certainly tries, but still fails, to be the leading man, and his performance just seems to similar to his in Blockers, a much better film from last year. I’m pretty sure the man is aware of his status as a meme and will try anything he can to continue getting publicity. This film is the prime example of it.
To their credit, the kids are believable and cute. They’re the only ones who give semi-decent performance, and they definitely don’t deserve the brunt of my criticism. If my earlier comments were the movie’s only faults, then it could have been okay. After all, they certainly tried, and there is potential in the heartwarming family scenes, but unfortunately, the film doesn’t exactly seem like it’s for kids or adults because of the confusing nature of its script and dialogue. The only really “good” thing about it is the soundtrack, which features punk bands like Social Distortion and Blink-182, but even then the songs just feel out of place compared to the rest of the movie’s atmosphere. I still just don’t understand who this film is supposed to be appealing to.
That being said, it’s one of the few “good-bad” movies that have come out this year. It’s hopelessly bad, but all the bad stuff combined makes it hilarious. Sure, it’s no Soul Plane, but there’s just something that makes the combination of awful acting, bad dialogue, and out-of-place humor in this film seem way more amusing then it seems like on the surface. My overall enjoyment just came from how bad it was, just like with some of my favorite movies of all time, but this is far from a favorite in my eyes.
1/5 STARS