WHY HIM?

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ROG'S VIEWPOINT - When overprotective dad Ned Fleming (Bryan Cranston), wife Barb (Megan Mullally) and son Scotty (Griffin Gluck) visit daughter Stephanie (Zoey Deutch) at Stanford over the holidays, all is not
merry. Her socially inelegant Silicon Valley billionaire boyfriend Laird Mayhew (James Franco) is about to ask her to marry him. Not approving of Laird and his high-tech world, Ned's worst nightmare is about to become real. "Why Him?" is a nightmarish comedy with very little to chuckle about. Bryan Cranston does his best to rise above the moronic script, which is from a story co-written by Jonah Hill. His expressive facial reactions to Franco's vulgar verbal and visual jokes are almost worth the price of admission. But the few genuine laughs are drowned in a wave of toilet humor. Co-writer/director John Hamburg, who co-wrote the screenplay for "Meet the Parents", settles for a pale imitation here. Even a running gag involving Laird's guru Gustav (Keegan-Michael Key) that's straight out of "The Pink Panther" only shows how funny Peter Sellers was. About that bathroom humor, "Why Him?" deserves to be flushed away. 2 cams

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