Movie Review: 80 for Brady

 

Michael's Movie Grade: B-

A charming and funny little movie.

This movie takes four major veteran stars, Lily Tomlin, Jane Fonda, Rita Moreno and Sally Field, and just lets them have a lot of fun. This is a light and fluffy film, but it doesn't pretend to be anything else. Naturally a lot of this film relies on the charisma of some true movie stars and the four of them are truly wonderful here. Each one is full of the pure movie star power that can neither be explained or denied and due to this from the very first scene, we already really like these characters. Adding to this is that the four seem to be having the time of their lives making this film and that causes us to have the time of our lives watching them. There is something that is just so charming about a comedy, where you can tell the cast was having a good time. This is probably because having a good time is what comedy is all about. The humor here is charmingly funny, even if it is rarely hilarious. While I did not laugh out loud at this film as much as I do at the best comedies, I had a smile on my face throughout and there were enough chuckles here to make up for this. There are though a few laugh out loud moments here, especially towards the last act and these are wonderful. Even the jokes that don't fully hit here have a nice charm to them that helps the movie move along at a brisk pace. Helping is that the four main characters play off each other very well, this is due to both the acting and the character's personalities. This can even make jokes that aren't that great work quite well. It is just simply fun to watch these characters play off each other.

There are a few scenes in this movie (they are not very prominent though) that are supposed to be emotional and serious and while these scenes are fan, often times the transition from silly comedy to sentimentality doesn't always work. The celebratory cameos (with the exception of Tom Brady and  Rob Gronkowski), don't always work and can sometimes seem more than a little forced. 

This film's credits say "Inspired by a True Story." I don't watch football and know very little about it, but I would guess that very little of this comes from that true story, with how silly and improbable much of the story is. This is not a complaint as it is actually something that gives this movie much of its charm. 

This is a good hearted and fun comedy. It may not be a great movie, but it doesn't try to be.