bkoganbing
In Meet The Parents Ben Stiller had to win the trust of Robert DeNiro and Blythe Danner the parents of his girl friend Teri Polo, that famed 'circle of trust' in the Byrnes family. Now the whole family is going to Florida where Stiller's parents the Fockers have a palatial estate and ideas that definitely run counter to those espoused by DeNiro.That opposition is the basis of the wonderful comedy in this sequel to Meet The Parents. With the casting of Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand as Stiller's parents, Meet The Fockers is as funny, maybe funnier than the original film.A whole lot of Focker family secrets are exposed in this comedy and with three of the biggest movie names in the past 40 years in the cast there was definitely built in box office. DeNiro, Hoffman, and Streisand show some incredible comic timing in this film.There's nothing these two families agree on. Even down to the fact that Hoffman's a dog person and DeNiro a cat person is humorous material. The cat turning on the dog in the DeNiro/Danner trailer is a memorable scene.Another favorite of mine are the touch football sequence. I doubt Kennedy family touch football was ever like this. There's also a memorable encounter with a Barney Fife like deputy where DeNiro, Hoffman, and Stiller all go to the pokey. Oddly enough Danner and Streisand hit it off well. Streisand is a sex therapist and makes good money doing it as we see by the way the Fockers live. In fact Hoffman though a lawyer became a stay at home dad. That really gets super macho DeNiro's dander up.Fans of any and all of the players here should make Meet The Fockers a must for your viewing list.
Steve Pulaski
The only thing worse than an unnecessary sequel is a sequel that can't figure out anything new or invigorating to do with its material, so it resorts to recycling the same structure, humor, and plot-points from the original film. Meet the Fockers is a uniformly lazy picture, yet only slightly placing itself a few notches below its grossly overrated predecessor. The film all but affirms the purpose of its franchise's existence is to subject Ben Stiller to one lifeless comedic setpiece after another, to make Robert De Niro a continuously intolerable character, and to take a cast that practically oozes personality and make them a boring assortment of caricatures.It all starts with the rehashed plot; this time, instead of Greg Focker (Ben Stiller) meeting his fiancée Pam Byrnes' (Teri Polo) parents, and enduring the awkwardness and uncertainty that follows, Pam, her notoriously strict father Jack (Robert De Niro), and her mother Dina (Blythe Danner) will travel from Oyster Bay, New York to Long Island by RV to meet Greg's mother and father. Also going along for the ride is Little Jack, Jack's one-year-old nephew who he simultaneously cuddles and teaches how to be a grown up despite still being an infant.One of the first shocks to Greg's family is, despite Greg being so controlling and tightly wound, Greg's parents, Bernie and Roz (Dustin Hoffman and Barbara Streisand), are so liberal and relaxed. The two welcome Jack and Dina with open arms, despite an evident behavioral shock taking place during casual conversation, as Bernie and Roz love to be open and free to discuss sex with their friends. Real drama, however, sets in when Greg reconnects with his old housekeeper Isabel Villalobos (Alanna Ubach), whom he slept with at a young age. Isabel now has a son that looks mysteriously like Greg and was birthed in a window similar to when him and Isabel slept together. As one can imagine, this causes immense discomfort between Greg and Pam, all while Jack is still trying to get Greg to fess up, as he believes he still isn't nearly as honest as he claims to be.The overblown nature of these films is what kills their vibe; their unsubtle humor works against every joke in a way that discredits the situation and the subsequent events. These films would work much better had to been conducted on a realistic scale, but when you have a cat who can flush a toilet, a baby who hears over three dozen simple words a day, yet his first word is a polysyllabic profanity, Greg's parents are such mind-numbing dolts who have no idea how to treat guests, and their is the possibility of an illegitimate son nobody spoke about, then the film becomes so far off course in its narrative it might as well be science-fiction.Furthermore, Meet the Fockers, as you'd expect, cops out with over a dozen jokes about Greg's birthname of "Gaylord Focker." This shows nothing else besides lazy writing on part of Jim Herzfeld and John Hamburg, as they continue to cherrypick elements from the previous film. However, if Meet the Parents was good for anything, aside from being a sitcom display of humor, it was also slightly original and tapped into the nervewracking idea most men have when it comes to meeting their girlfriend or fiancée's parents. It reached out and explored that often unexplored area of anxiety and nervousness that stems from what should theoretically be a very positive and respectful time for both parties. However, due to the desire to not only impress, but wow, there is a discernible level of anxiety that takes over and frequently makes the first couple interactions so awkward and unsettling.Yet Meet the Parents, as stated, what a sitcom display of such events; a bogus, redundant collection of overblown scenarios that Meet the Fockers replicates in an even more mediocre fashion. Talent that has proved themselves worthy of high recognition succumbs to the repetitive nature of situational antics, most of which fall flat on their face and provide nothing else for the characters to do besides frantically run around and scream bloody murder at every turn. Meet the Fockers is a monotonous exercise that, in turn, makes its mediocre predecessor appear worth of praise.Starring: Ben Stiller, Teri Polo, Robert De Niro, Blythe Danner, Dustin Hoffman, Barbara Streisand, and Alanna Ubach. Directed by: Jay Roach.
daworldismine
this sequel to the very funny meet the parents, is so funny that i was laughing out loud all the way through, the cast were brilliant, and stiller and deniro are even better second time around, and both are at the top of there game, pure hilarity eveytime they are on screen, there is also a funny cameo by stiller regular owen Wilson, and hes funnier here than he was in the first. some people might find it inferior to the first one, as there are a few gross out gags in this one, and a lot of sexual references. to me though this is a much better movie all around, and the sub plot with ben stiller's 'son' horhey, is some of the funniest stuff I've seen in a movie. im a fan of ben stiller i find his type of comedy very funny, and this is another winner from him, there is another sequel after this 'little fockers' but it's not very good and is nowhere near as funny as the first 2, and especially this one. if you want a giggle go and rent this movie now, you'll be howling
ctomvelu1
Yet another sequel that should never have been made, FOCKERS has Teri Polo's parents (DeNiro and Danner) driving to Florida to meet and spend time with Ben Stiller's parents (Hoffman and Streisand). Polo's parents bring along a young grandson who serves as the Cheetah (Tarzan's comic relief) in this fairly lame movie. Whole bits from the original are reused here, but they're not as funny the second time around. The novelty here is having Hoffman and DeNiro appear together -- and for the most ardent movie buffs, they will spot Pacino in a very brief scene. The three great ethnic actors of the 20th century in one movie! The vulgar jokes pile up pretty quickly, most of which aren't particularly funny. Ah well, none of this matters as the movie made a fortune. It's a formula comedy.
