WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU’RE EXPECTING (Kirk Jones). 110 minutes. Opens Friday (May 18). For venues and times, see Movies. Rating: NN
Don’t expect much from What To Expect When You’re Expecting. The latest guidebook translated to the big screen (after Think Like A Man) offers vignettes illustrating exactly what the title suggests: the bumps you’ll encounter down the road after a woman first notices her baby bump.
The mosaic-like film follows five moms-to-be – all looking like they’re ready to grace the cover of Cosmopolitan – and the men they drag along on their nine-month journey to parenthood. Such chopped-up screen time means they’re less fleshed-out characters than types, making you yearn for something along the lines of Knocked Up.
Some aspects ring surprisingly true, particularly Cameron Diaz’s control freak and Elizabeth Banks’s on-point depiction of a pregnancy from hell. There’s also an unexpected miscarriage, but the filmmakers neuter the emotional wreckage here with the standard pop-song montage treatment.
Somebody clearly wanted to move on to the upbeat stuff as quickly as possible, and that’s the biggest problem. For all the wisdom it may have to offer, What To Expect would rather resort to immature humour for kicks.
Many of these gags are so forcibly contrived, the movie seems to be going through labour to deliver them.
